In Australia in 2011 and 2012 there was a fun “contest” of developing the best shohin bonsai in a period of about 14 months. The object was to post a number of progression photos of your tree over the period and then the trees were voted on to see which was the best by popular choice.
It was a lot of fun and made many of us think about how you could develop convincing bonsai in a short period of time. It also provided people with the opportunity to learn from others – both from their successes and the failures – and to see the trees progress over the allocated time period.
One of the trees I worked on was a Japanese Box (Buxus Microphylla) that was purchased from a garden centre nursery. When purchased the tree was about 750mm tall with the object of reducing it to under 250mm tall over the period of the contest.
The above photo shows the shrub before any work had commenced.
In October 2011 I did the first cutting and styling of this tree. The idea was to remove all unwanted material and to set the tree on it’s course towards being a shohin.
The first styling.
As you can imagine by reducing a tree by two thirds there is a lot of unwanted foliage, and in fact that foliage filled a standard garbage bin!
The discarded foliage.
In February 2012 I decided that it was time to reduce the root mass and to plant the tree into a bonsai pot. However when I started I discovered that there was too much root to cut off and so for the health of the tree I placed it into a wooden box until it had recovered.
First root reduction and into a wooden box.
In late May 2012 I gave the tree a good trim but in retrospect I should have let it go through winter with a fuller foliage pad.
The pre-winter trim.
In August 2012 the tree had not grown much but it was still healthy and there were signs of new growth just developing.
August 2012
In late August I finally potted it into a bonsai pot for the first time. This pot is just a training pot for now, but it is doing the job and has again improved the look of this now little bonsai.
October 2012.
The “contest” finished at the end of October 2012 and the photo above is the final photo of this tree before judging began.
The whole exercise was a fun ride over a short period of time in bonsai terms and it does go to show what can be done. I will continue to work on this tree over the coming years and I hold out hope that it will progress into a presentable shohin in the not too distant future.