Trident maple ground layer.
Posted: August 6th, 2023, 6:54 pm
Four or five years ago I stopped to grab a coffee in Turramurra on Sydney's North Shore. I walked past a lovely old house that was about to be demolished. Always on the lookout for urban yamadori, I spied a couple of large (10ft tall) trident maples in the garden. When I asked the site foreman about them he said he'd be willing to dig them out with the backhoe. I kept one and gave the other to a mate.
The one I kept had a nice chunky trunk with good taper and a bit of interesting movement. It had originally been growing in a black plastic pot which had been placed in the garden and forgotten about. Not surprisingly the tree had rooted through the bottom of the pot. It had a large, thick circling root within which the remains of the black plastic pot were still embedded. There was only one thing for it - a ground layer.
The first year after attempting the ground layer the tree didn't produce any roots, just a big callous. So the second year I sliced off the bottom of the callous and treated again with rooting hormone. After a couple of months I noticed that the tree was still not producing any roots. I happened to come out late one evening and saw heaps of slugs in the sphagnum around ground layer site. After treating with snail and slug repellent the tree began growing new roots the next week.
In spring of 2022 the roots from the ground layer were finally good enough to remove the old base. A chainsaw was used - a very trusting mate held back the delicate new nebari, with the blade cutting only centimeters from his fingers. The tree was planted into a large plastic tub, with a very free draining soil mix, and allowed to grow freely for a season, during which time it put on a lot of growth.
On the 4th of August 2023 I wired the remaining branches and shortened the top section of the trunk to improve the taper. The tree went into a large bonsai pot. The nebari, while a huge improvement on what was there before the ground layering, are still not perfect and will probably require root grafts over the years.
The pot it is in is quite deep and a bit over sized, so I'm hoping the tree will be able to grow freely enough to develop the primary branches and apex in this pot. I will continue to post updates on this tree as it develops over the years.
The one I kept had a nice chunky trunk with good taper and a bit of interesting movement. It had originally been growing in a black plastic pot which had been placed in the garden and forgotten about. Not surprisingly the tree had rooted through the bottom of the pot. It had a large, thick circling root within which the remains of the black plastic pot were still embedded. There was only one thing for it - a ground layer.
The first year after attempting the ground layer the tree didn't produce any roots, just a big callous. So the second year I sliced off the bottom of the callous and treated again with rooting hormone. After a couple of months I noticed that the tree was still not producing any roots. I happened to come out late one evening and saw heaps of slugs in the sphagnum around ground layer site. After treating with snail and slug repellent the tree began growing new roots the next week.
In spring of 2022 the roots from the ground layer were finally good enough to remove the old base. A chainsaw was used - a very trusting mate held back the delicate new nebari, with the blade cutting only centimeters from his fingers. The tree was planted into a large plastic tub, with a very free draining soil mix, and allowed to grow freely for a season, during which time it put on a lot of growth.
On the 4th of August 2023 I wired the remaining branches and shortened the top section of the trunk to improve the taper. The tree went into a large bonsai pot. The nebari, while a huge improvement on what was there before the ground layering, are still not perfect and will probably require root grafts over the years.
The pot it is in is quite deep and a bit over sized, so I'm hoping the tree will be able to grow freely enough to develop the primary branches and apex in this pot. I will continue to post updates on this tree as it develops over the years.
