So I've had this guy for a couple months now and played it very safe with the trimming.
Well I finally developed the stones to take it to chop town and here she is. Fingers crossed huh?
As always criticism and advice is very welcome.
How is it going? I’ve just joined, new to bonsai. I chopped a leptospermum maddidum yesterday, a few years old from neglected nursery stock. I currently utilise a “chop and pray” approach to starting my bonsai haha
I think it looks fine Blackfoot, but now it is time to fertilize and water. IMO it has the bones to be a nice shohin so if it were mine I would work towards that.
Good start!
I don't know the variety, Xena, but there's a good chance it'll shoot again.
I keep a lot of my leptos and other natives in a shallow tray during the heat of summer. It might be worth trying too.
Next Sept - Oct I'd say it'd be worth repotting and root-pruning, if it is still with you. It's important to get the roots right as well as the top of the plant, and nursery plants often have a mess of crazy tangled downward pointing roots that are useless when it comes to potting into a smaller pot.
In Katherine I'd say Spring would be the best time to do this work, but I'm only guessing... most plants will go into a slow down over the worst heat of summer.
Leptospermum madidum sub so. Sativum in the tropics grow wild. I left one branch on and choppedtop off. With branch I left I did 2 thread grafts. Growing well I am just waiting for new branches to grow thicker than the ones going into trunk. They do get myrtle rust in the tropics. Ljs