Metasequoia Glyptostroboides - Dawn Redwood

[alpineart]

This is one tree I should have left alone but I just couldn't help myself have another go at a chop and grow

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Reduced from over 3 metres down to 1 metre , this took place back in February . Some new pics today shows the new growth ready for wiring

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One benefit from the covid situation is My son is home and has offered to wire the trunk tomorrow , under my care and supervision of course . Its been many years since he has bothered with bonsai but it will be a good day at the office so to speak .

Cheers . Alpineart

[juan73870]

Please post more pictures after the wiring is done, I'm super interested in this species at the moment. Thanks for another awesome post, Alpine!

[alpineart]

Hi Jaun , mate I was surprised that this redwood outgrew the swampies in the same bed . It has never lost its foliage in winter either , but then most of my Chinese Elms keep their leaves here also .

Cheers . Alpine

[Matthew]

Alpine
Surprised your elms keep there leaves. Half mine are naked already.

[juan73870]

Interesting, see im in Adelaide and I've had one for a few months now, 1.5m tall in a pot still, yet to make the chop - I'm going to do some layers later in the year, but it has no sign whatsoever of leaves changing or dropping yet. They're such beautiful trees, though. I love them!

Edit : in fact, none of my trees have shown autumn signs as yet...

[alpineart]

Alpine
Surprised your elms keep there leaves. Half mine are naked already.

Hi Matthew , mate I have a crab apple that flowered 6 weeks ago I removed the flowers and it has began to flower again , all the Chinese elms are still growing and elongating , A passionfruit is budding up with flowers and the tridents are powering on with new growth as usual .

I have had 1 elm over the last 20 years that went dormant all the rest have kept their leaves . All the Redwoods I have had here have never dropped their foliage , they do change colour from green to reddish brown but dont dry out and drop off .

I have a few Swampies in the same grow bed 1 has dropped its foliage 2 others are growing green

Must be something in the water

Cheers . Alpine

[alpineart]

Hi Jaun , there are plenty of signs of autumn around here , just across the road has beautiful colours but nothing happening in my yard .

If your contemplating layers be sure to brace the branch or apex as they snap easily once the thick bark is removed .I lost all my layers in a single day with a few strong gusts of wind .

Cheers Alpine.

[alpineart]

Well it has been wired but not by my son , his conditional help wasn't except able . I couldn't hang onto a postie bike let alone a 500cc thumper so I did the job myself .

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Its rough enough for a basic shaping . I did have a bit of a scratch around the base to check for roots and it good and bad but won't know for sure until the young bloke digs it out . Noahs idea of wiring was to jin the top 250mm so he didn't have to wire the new shoot . The old saying "it's hard to get good help , even from family".

Cheers . Alpineart

[juan73870]

I reckon it looks pretty good, I just love the bark on them, yours looks especially spectacular

[alpineart]

Hi Juan, the bark is a special feature on the redwoods . I will cut this back to a new leader after a bit of thickening and healing occurs and on and above the trunk chop .
Wiring is very rough but it was a major effort just to get a 3mm wire on the main branches . Its well and truly secure in the ground with no movement at the base .
I did plant plastic sheeting under the trunk to aid a flat base but it has definitely breached that and gone to ground .

It will be interesting to see if it goes dormant and drops its foliage after this workout .

Cheers . Alpine

[boom64]

Great job ,nice and powerful tree Alpine. Love the subtle movement in the trunk. Cheers John.

[alpineart]

Hi John , thanks mate , it does have a very nice trunk . be interesting to see the narebri when its removed

Cheers . Alpine

[Pat3222]

G'day Neil,
That's looking great, nice work. How long have you had it in the ground for? I have 2 in pots that have a long way to go. Your experience has been the opposite of mine so far. I have 3 swampies and 2 Redwoods all the same age. Started roughly the same size 18 months ago, in 40cm black plastic pots. The swampies have outgrown the redwoods 2-1 in trunk width. Currently the 5 would be lucky to have 30 green leaves left between them. Was the same story last year. I'm on the coast just past Geelong and haven't seen a frost since I moved here. Ground temp up your way in winter would be higher than pot temp here (I'd guess) but I wouldnt think by much. Will be watching this with interest. When are you hoping to pot it up?
Cheers
Pat

[alpineart]

hi Pat , mate the name is Ian, not to be confused with Neil or I might begin to wonder who I am myself .

Its been in the ground for 18 months , from memory which is not too flash the trunk was around 25 mm , the smallest of the ones I had , its now 110 mm at ground level .

There is 1 main root at the front which is 30mm ,bigger than the trunk when I put it in the ground must have found the horse manure I buried with the excavator {not the Horse} just a trailer load of manure .

The swampies approx' 1 metre away have grown about 10mm , I chopped them down as they didn't really thicken much .

The ground here freezes like the Bonsai pots , temps get to minus 5-6 in winter . This has new growth since wiring all light green end foliage , it does have 1 reddish brown branch in the upper apex all the rest is green and growing .

I will lift it in late winter early spring .

Cheers . Ian - Alpineart

[Pat3222]

G'day... Ian.

Face palm indeed, my brain registered Shibui somehow..

That's an awesome gain for the Redwoods. I'll have to put mine in the ground. Will be interesting to see if they hold foliage longer next year as a result. I've always assumed that most typically deciduous plants might hold leaves in warmer climates not colder. +0.6 is the coldest temp ever recorded here, back in 1999. You know what they say about assuming.. I'll bury some manure, (or a horse haha) along with them and see what happens.

Cheers
Pat