AusBonsai

Hi guys, looking for any tips or advice on my growing stock of rosemary, juniper and bottlebrush pieces. I grabbed these quickly and have found myself staying up all night and scrambling to provide the best containers, make my own, purchase rooting compound, and refining my soil mixtures. I am in Southern California, and we are having our first wet winter in ages. I jumped the gun Christmas Eve making my family two Dwarf Aspen Spruces (bad call), a Juniper, then one for myself, a few ficus prefabricated from Walmart earlier this year, and now 4 rosemary shrubs and a mystery plant. Plus a heavily discounted Bottlebrush I am not sure how to style yet.

Any and all advice is appreciated. I'm not glued to anything yet, but find myself leaning towards penjing and cascade styling. I like to decorate my landscape, a crossover from my year refining 100 different cacti and succulents from nearly all propagated wild stock. Learn to grow from dying plants and cuttings made the learning curve all the more fun. Here's what I'm currently working with. Any thoughts would be great. Looking forward to learning and sharing with you all, the world of bonsai and I already share a deep and growing bond. Cheers!

I am considering switching this to an upright position, much of the trunk is under soil and has some great nebari potential, as well as adding to the trunk diameter. Plus there seems to be a lot of bark and soft wood I will be able to remove once the plant recovers and roots. I used a rooting powder on this as well.








These are my newest finds, one a rosemary I believe, the other I asked about in another section. Both have terrific lines and much of the bark looks as though it will remove easily and expose openings in the trunk I'm looking forward to exploring.. Not the best before pictures, my apologies..









My first wired creation with a Juniper from nursery stock. The hideous pot is killing me, but bonsai is a game of patience..







And my Bottlebrush I trimmed and wired a bit, but I'm not sure where to go from here..

Oh, and the 10 straight hours of work my first 3 bonsai stylings I started on Xmas Eve thinking it would take 3 hours tops. More like 3 hours a piece. Humbling and rewarding, sad to see them both go to my families homes the next day, but I'm certain it won't be the last I see of these fellows.





What they started as. I'd like to think I got better with each round, but the Aspens were a poor choice in retrospect..



And some pre-styled ficus I was messing with before I got serious. Can't wait for spring to come so I can repot. Hopefully I can wait.



Lastly, a slice of my cacti and succulent playground. A few years ago my backyard was a source of constant weeds and annoyance. Huge. A year after a grew my green thumbs, it's never felt smaller..

Please do not use offsite image hosting services
easy to upload them direct to the site so links never get broken
viewtopic.php?f=97&t=54

Ken

Photos would help. Cannot see anything.

I note you have mentioned a Callistemon among the long list. We find that most Aussie plants have different requirements from Northern trees. Most prefer to be root pruned in summer when they are active. Maybe Southern Cal is warm enough to get away with it like Sydney or Perth but in cooler climates repotting in winter is a death sentence for Callistemon.

kcpoole wrote:Please do not use offsite image hosting services
easy to upload them direct to the site so links never get broken
viewtopic.php?f=97&t=54

Ken

The problem with uploading to this site is you can't then share a link to friends unless they create an account, as I had to to be able to look at a tree for sale.