My first Black Pine

[Shinkitai]

After watching the karate kid when I was younger I was fascinated by Bonsai, so when I first started to get into it a little more seriously 20 years later I had to of course get a Japanese Black Pine. I now know and have learnt along the way it is not any easy species for beginners but hey everyone has to have one!

I got this little one from Bonsai World on the Gold Coast and went through various stages of trying to do something with it and somehow not killing it I finally realised I didn't know what to do with it so chucked it into a patio pot. A couple of kids later and an occasional look/hack at it over a few years I decided to revisit it. I cut the top branch out of it and made some little adjustments and put it into a large bonsai pot. Initially I was pretty happy with the results but the more I looked it I realised it was ok but nowhere near as good as it could be.

A few months ago I decided to get a little more serious about this bonsai hobby and try and improve a little faster then my trial and error method had achieved so far. I reread some of my books, searched the internet and joined this awesome forum. The final stage was joining the local bonsai club (Gold Coast - Tweed Bonsai Club). The first meeting I went to was a workshop meeting so I took along the black pine. Lucky I hadn't done to much damage over the years and I was very fortunate that Carol who used to run Bonsai World was there and she provided so much amazing help and advice, including choosing a new front. The tree has now been transformed into something I can see developing into a great tree over the years. There are plenty of holes to be filled in with how it currently looks but is on a great road now.

For any newbies in the forum I would strongly recommend doing a course at a local centre and joining a local club, you will learn so much so quickly and get a lot more out of this great past time.

So there is the story of this Black Pine, here are some photos of its progression.

[bonsaibruce]

Howdy,
Years ago while in Hawaii I went to the house of the man who made the bonsai for Karate Kid. Nice man.
Happy bonsai,
Bruce.

[Boics]

Great progression and thanks for sharing.

[kcpoole]

nice story, and congrats for keeping it alive all those years too
looking much better now than the original tree

Ken

[anthonyW]

Very nice work by you and your mentor.
Anthony

[dragon]

Very nice work by you and your mentor.
Anthony

gday anthony it is good to see you here sorry i never saw you introduce yourself but welcomeeeeeeeee
and shinkitai you have done a very good job keeping it well
cheers dean

[anthonyW]

You trouble maker, OK, hi from me, hows that, suppose you'll want a tree up next.

[Mark330]

Great pics..and progression.

[Shinkitai]

The JBP keeps powering along. Lots of new growth and buds, it has had a few more candles.

I have removed buds growing in the wrong place, older needles and some of the newer longer needles to direct the energy to the buds and help them grow into secondary/tertiary branches. Hope this is the right thing to do at this time of year

Looking at the photo the top right branch needs to come down more in line with the other branches.

Black-Pine-1---1-March-2013.jpg

Black-Pine-1--21-March-2013b.jpg

[Shinkitai]

Black Pine 1 - 3 December 2013.JPG

An update on the black pine, it is still powering along. It was starting to look like the bottom 2 branches were creating a bar so am attempting to bring one side down further.