So, here it was when I bought it home 31 August 2011.
The main stem must have been damaged causing a ring of ariel roots to form and reach to potting mix. At some stage the stem died and the tree fell over.
I struggled with which way to style it. Wrap it back over and make an informal upright, leave the basic shape and create a semi-cascade or go for a full cascade. My experience on styling Bonsai was very limited at this stage, still is really, and the branches were long and lanky. As you can see by the picture taken the next day, I really didn't have much of an idea.
Over the next 9 months I applied more wire, trimmed, defoliated, looked at it, looked at it some more, tweaked the wiring, removed wire, looked at it again. I considered removing branches, raised one, dropped another and started to see an image that I liked. I got it to this stage on the 29 june 2012
Well I basically have gone through the same system as before of trimming, defoliating, looking, tweaking, looked, removing wire, applying wire and as of a few nights ago it looked like this.
This fig has always had a prominent position in my nursery, actually my driveway, and so I walked past it every day and have grown quite fond of it. I recently moved, all of 15m down some stairs (outside ones), and so I wasn't walking past it and needed to remedy the situation. So I brought it down, gave it a light trim and a hefty wiring. (The most wire I have put on any one tree).
It's hard to convey it's movement and grace in a photo and I don't know if it's my poor photographic skills, or just a difficult subject, but here is how it stands as of 2 days ago, 18 months after its first chop.
and taken from slightly above
I will only let the tip extend a little further and concentrate now on branch ramification and twiggy growth in the cascade. The top still needs a fair bit of development, but the internodes are long and stretch quickly if left so it's going to be hard to thicken the trunk on the top while developing the tree. I maybe should have let it go more before styling to thicken up, but you all know what us learners are like.
It will be just up to growing it well for many years to achieve thickness and no doubt much enjoyment.Would love to hear any comments on style and how to improve my photography.
