AusBonsai

Hi Chrisatrocky , they back shoot very and reduce also . If you pull a leaf off it ramifies almost immediately .To age the trunks into knarly limbs wire tight and leave until the wire cuts in , quite the opposite to normal bonsai , i can here the roar now .

Hi V.S All my ways are learned bad behavior No rules means no mistakes i think that's how it goes . Seriously mate hack and chop thousands of plants and sooner or later you get it right , don't worry i still have disasters every now and again , but they get fewer and farther between .

Got too have a good sense of humour also . Cheers and Happy Bonsai

Hi guys!
New member, brought here by a google that lets me know when someone says "Portulacaria" . I have about 100 of em right now so obviously they're my favorite, I live on in the USA in Florida and they love it here.

Was reading the threads, lots of great advice! I'm fortuante to live about 40 minutes from Jim Smith who is considered a master of P. afra so I have seen lots of them LOL. Have a few hints to share .

If you're going to wire, let the plant dry down until the leaves juuuuuuust start to wrinkle to reduce the number of branches snapping. When they're well watered they are very turgid and break way too easily to wire. Then you can wire them in circles if you want (did it once as an experiment).

When rooting, on the huge ones yes let em dry over a few days. I don't bother on anything the size of a finger or smaller, but I also don't water until I see new growth or until the newest leaves are starting to wrinkle (or until mother nature gives em a drink on her own). I've not taken cuttings as big as what you guy are doing because I've not found any interesting trunks that size-they're usually telephone poles. I start em out smaller so I can bend them into something interesting, bending something an inch thick is frustrating.

Don't be afraid to whack back. Mine are usually sticks and stumps when I'm done on their first major overhaul. If you take one to Jim Smith, you will guaranteed have zero leaves and probably not many branches after a styling....but he's right, they come back (provided you dont let them get soggy). I've learned to cut to the closest to the trunk nodes on branches.

A hint on getting "interesting"-let em dry and let them get potbound. When in the ground, they tend to grow straigth telephone poles because of plenty of room and water. When in confined pots, they don't grow quite as fast and you can control them better. When they dry down, the bark gets more interesting from the shrinking/expanding-many of mine are cracked and gnarly from drying out.

And last hint: "real" jade isn't as great of a bonsai subject as P. afra , can't tell you how many emails I get from people saying thier jade doesn't look like the jade they see on the internet...........if it were me I'd ban the use of Baby Jade forever LOL.

Hi nsmar4211, welcome to Ausbonsai . Thanks for the info , by all means post here some of your portulacaria's here or start a new topic .Thats basically the advice i got from spending time with Eric , he too was a wizard with these weeds .

Cheers Alpineart

chrisatrocky wrote:sorry Hornet, bot Crassula ovata has large rounded fleshy leaves and Crassula gollum (correct spelling) has finger like flesshy leaves. C. gollum is often miss labled C.ovata or C ovata 'gollum' which are wrong.

this is C.ovata

Crassula_ovata_700.jpg

this is C. gollum

untitled.png

.

and yes, there are 100's of Cassula varieties, but these 2 varieties are probably the most common found in gardens.

Sorry Chris but gollum is just a variety of ovata, weather this is gollum or not i really dont think we can say, there are a number of ovata forms that have this leave shape that unless we know the history of the tree we cant say 100% what variety it is. That being said the id doesnt really matter as all have the same needs

I know there is some confusion among the experts of the exact lineage of "gollum" but i believe its current official name is Crassula ovata cv. GOLLUM

yes Hornet, there is a lot of confusion and in this case you are right and so am I.

http://www.cactus-art.biz/schede/CRASSU ... gollum.htm

chris

Alpine,
Any updates? Would love to see how your beautiful tree is doing? To me it looks like baobab style.

Hi Neli , mate i haven't killed it yet but i haven't done any more work on it either . It did get hit by a frost and is recovering . I will take some picks and do an update .

Cheers Alpine

Hi Neli , here you go mate . Like i said nothing done but you have motivated me to get into it and do some work . Its still a little dehydrated from the frost attack but i will slip pot it now and do some work on refining it .

Cheers Alpine

Thanks Darling.
I can see you have not done much. Start pinching and wiring Baba or I am coming to get it. You have gem there.
I am going to look for some pictures....I want to inspire you to start working on it.

Hi Neli , number 2 pic was the lines i was thinking along and its already done . Certainly got some inspiration from these pictures .

Cheers Alpine

Well i decided to do some work on this one . Using a few slings to lif and hold the branches in the desired position i then gave it a basic trim and it can grow on a fill out . The 2nd pic Neli posted was along the lines of the original plan but with a more open separated canopy defining each branch into a foliage pad rather then a full canopy .

Cheers Alpine

That is better! Now I am going to work also on the 2 that I transplanted 2 weeks ago...Probably they are ready for chop chop. I have not been watering them much...only twice in two weeks...so they should me more flexible.
Doont you think you have some too straight sections on the trunk? I mean: rear left sub trunk.