AusBonsai

G'day,

After recent discussions I've had with Jow and the resuraction of the thread How to grow good bonsai stock like the Japanese nurseries, Shibui posted that he had some Maple seedlings for sale so I purchased some:

They arrived very healthy in brown paper packages tied up with string
My plan is to grow them all on but eventually only select the best few to keep and pass the rest on to others.
To give them the best start possible, I have followed Koji Hirimatsu's advice that he gave me at the recent Adelaide AABC convention about growing high quality shohin material:
• I worked the roots right from the start to achieve an even, radial spread.
• I've wired all trunks with exaggerated movement starting right from the base, ensuring no straight sections. I've made the bends forwards and backwards as well as side to side.
• I'll now let the trunks and branches grow freely after the wired sections to create the energy to fatten the trunks and branches.
• Any low branches will be encouraged to grow freely and uninhibited to act as sacrifice branches.
During my early days of bonsai my first teacher, Ron Flack taught me his 'Holey Ron' method of using a tourniquet to generate new roots. I couldn't find any washers the right size so I had to get creative
Some of the others I'm going to grow into groups so I used some sheet aluminium instead of washers.
In a weeks time I'll tweak the bends to compress and exaggerate them further. After that it will be full sun and hopefully they will be off to a good start at becoming future bonsai.

Looking good Steven!

Great to see you up-cycling replica currency and signage.

I've got a few hundred seeds planted this year and a hundred or so that were wired up a year ago to keep me busy this year. It will be good to see the results after a few season's growth.

Everyone should really be doing this!

Joe

Awesome thread Steven. I love it! Update this over time for sure. Will be great to watch.

This could be known as the 'Divine Growth Method'... i.e. from Holly Coins.

Excellent post Steve, thanks for sharing. I wish I had started doing this years ago...

Matt.

Good going Steven. Nice to see real enthusiasm.

Thanks guy's, only took about 3 hours to do the 70 or so tree's so it's pretty achievable for everyone to give it a go.

I wish I had been doing this 10 years ago!

If we all did it can you imagine the quality of the material that would be floating around?!

During my early days of bonsai my first teacher, Ron Flack taught me his 'Holey Ron' method of using a tourniquet to generate new roots. I couldn't find any washers the right size so I had to get creative

Really interesting to see this post here tonight. I spent today digging trident maples out of the grow beds.Here's one - and look what's under the roots
When the metal sheet is removed you can still see the 'navel' where the original trunk went through the hole. I have been using these pieces of roadsign (obtained legally from the scrapyard) for about 15 years now and just keep recycling them. Obviously the one above has been allowed to grow to a larger sized pre bonsai but the same technique also produces great smaller trees. I have heard others talking about using steel washers but unless it is a large washer with a small hole I don't think it will achieve as good a result because the roots would not spread quite as wide.

Thank you for posting this thread Steven, seems we shop at the same place and I think I'll be doing the same thing with some of mine! Now to find some "legally aquired" aluminium sheeting...

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How does this method of planting on a disc compare to just regular lifting and pruning of the roots. It looks like this method still produces some large thick roots that need to be addressed?

I have a few road signs...what's the best way to cut them?


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I think the goal is to have them flare out a lot more due to the flat surface.

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Isitangus wrote:I have a few road signs...what's the best way to cut them?

Hack saw or angle grinder, depending on how hard you feel like working. Make sure you have a vice.

Good post Steven.

I did similar to your groups using tiles to create trident clumps. But didn't take photos ....

I noticed you didn't have much soil above the metal sheet. I started potting mine into colanders but was concerned I didn't have enough soil above the tile which would have been about 4cm deep. I then reverted to deeper pots leaving about 10cm above the tile for the new roots. Do you think that was a waste of time for me or do you plan to pot them up into deeper pots as the new roots develop?

Cheers,
Nigel

I then reverted to deeper pots leaving about 10cm above the tile for the new roots.

If these are tridents Nigel they are very strongly surface rooted. I would be very surprised if your trees did not have lots of roots all the way up the buried trunks after the first year. I would certainly be lifting them up much closer to the surface. How deep is one of those unanswerable questions. The need to be deep enough so the tender new roots don't dry out in summer but not deep enough so the trunk stays damp and grows new roots. I keep them in the nursery for the first summer so they get watered every day. When the roots have established and reached the edge of the tile they can be planted out in the ground and will tolerate a few dry spells.

How does this method of planting on a disc compare to just regular lifting and pruning of the roots. It looks like this method still produces some large thick roots that need to be addressed?

This method will produce flat lateral roots far more often than just pruning the roots. As Phoenix points out, I have noticed that the base of the trunks also flares out more when grown through the holes.
I don't think anyone has said you won't get thick roots with this method - they are still roots and, if you let them, one or 2 grow faster and dominate.
Maybe you are diplomatically trying to point out that I should have lifted these and pruned the roots a bit more often? - You are absolutely correct - Mea Culpa

Thanks Neil, you been a great help with this project.