AusBonsai

Fantastic progress Ryce ,looks like you are getting some good growth happening even in pots .Great movement , very inspiring. Cheers John.

boom64 wrote: ↑March 21st, 2022, 9:24 pm Fantastic progress Ryce ,looks like you are getting some good growth happening even in pots .Great movement , very inspiring. Cheers John.

Nothing but pot grown for these, and small ones too (nothing over 18cm). Highly rate them for people with not much room and no ground to develop in.
Thanks for the kind words mate.

Ryceman3 wrote:

boom64 wrote: ↑March 21st, 2022, 9:24 pm Fantastic progress Ryce ,looks like you are getting some good growth happening even in pots .Great movement , very inspiring. Cheers John.

Nothing but pot grown for these, and small ones too (nothing over 18cm). Highly rate them for people with not much room and no ground to develop in.
Thanks for the kind words mate.

Another great thing about allocasuarina / casuarina is how easy they are from seed. Grab a few pods, put them in a bag and after a few weeks you'll have plenty of seed. Now is a pretty good time to collect the seed pods - might be just a fraction too late in some areas though.

Sent from my SM-G975F using Tapatalk

Did a bit of work on this sheoak today (coincidentally) so thought I'd put up a progression shot.
I haven't really done much on them heading into winter before but I'm going on the theory they can be worked any month of the year. Cold weather coming up over the next week so we'll see what happens ... I'm not too concerned.

I cut mine back today for the same reason. They were extremely hairy after six months of rain, now we have strong dry cold winds, it will be interesting!

Here's an update on a few of these sheoaks that I worked on in the last week or so.
Lots of different stuff going on with these, too much to really talk about each one but basically I'll let them all grow now for a few weeks before I think about repotting.

They're all pretty interesting, but this one takes my eye the most.

melbrackstone wrote: ↑January 20th, 2023, 6:14 pm They're all pretty interesting, but this one takes my eye the most.

AL-02 IG_01.jpg

Yeah… it’s a nice one. I’ll try get you a close up!

Ryceman3 wrote: ↑January 20th, 2023, 9:08 pm

melbrackstone wrote: ↑January 20th, 2023, 6:14 pm They're all pretty interesting, but this one takes my eye the most.

AL-02 IG_01.jpg

Yeah… it’s a nice one. I’ll try get you a close up!

As promised ...

Thanks for that Ryan, that's a very cool little tree!

Getting late in the season to be repotting, but gave this sheoak a new pot today.
It's a Murrumbung pot that was produced in partnership with bonsai island a couple of years back ... I have had it for a little while now with nothing in it, so thought it was time to put it to work. I think it looks pretty good.

Hey R,
Casuarina branch plucking question. I usually leave two branches at each tip running and break the rest short. This works fine as it creates ramification, but I never have a tree with uniform short 'needles'. I can't see what you have done here have you snapped them all short or do they still have growing tips?

Cheers,
Symon

delisea wrote: ↑March 18th, 2023, 6:13 pm Hey R,
Casuarina branch plucking question. I usually leave two branches at each tip running and break the rest short. This works fine as it creates ramification, but I never have a tree with uniform short 'needles'. I can't see what you have done here have you snapped them all short or do they still have growing tips?

Cheers,
Symon

Hi Symon,
Casuarina don’t really have “needles”. I think you know this, but the foliage is actually branches and the leaves are tiny little things that circle around each internode as the branch extends. If the branch is young then a gentle tug will break it back at an internode, which is ideal. This is my main method of keeping things in check, and you just pluck back to the silhouette you are looking for. If the branching is more mature you need to cut above an internode and it will die back to that (leaving a brown tip). I do this more when developing branch structure because you’ll get a lot of budding back along the branch to create ramification.
Hope that makes sense/answers you question!

Hey Ryce,
Thanks for the reply! Yep, I understand how Casuarinas work, but it's always good to explain as others will be reading. Remember people, for the green branches don't cut only snap.

I think my issue is that I always let a couple of branches run and the meristem on these might suppress some of the backbudding. My problem might be solved.

It is 37C at my joint today I can safely assume it is still growing season, I might do some plucking and see what happens...

Btw nice pot change, an old nanban would look good too.
Cheers,
S

Got a few pots for some of the other trees in this thread recently, so have been doing a bit of repotting over the last few days or so and moving these into proper bonsai pots (some for the first time, others transitioning to what I consider to be more appropriate pots aesthetically).
All the new pots came from Elaine at Bonsai Island, good service and great selection from her as usual!