A Sneak Preview For My AusBonsai Friends: River Red Gum

[Dario]

Thanks for answering my Questions Fly
Look forward to seeing your River Red in the next update.
Cheers, Dario.

[GavinG]

As you say, more than enough to clog your mix. Please check some other references to attapulgite on this forum - a number of us have found it disastrous. As alternatives, pumice, diatomite, zeolite all hold some water as well as keeping the mix open.

Have a fine Spring, and keep us in touch with what you are up to.

Gavin

[KyBonzai]

My hats off to you fly, this would have to be my favorite progression series on the site. Lately i have been looking at lots of topics on Aussie natives so today i dug up 4 Euc seedlings and a paperbark tree ( it think thats what it is ?) the eucs had nearly no feeder roots mainly just tap root so they survive.
your tree reminds me so much of the australian outback ... i love it... would love to see how its coming along
cheers

[PiledHigherandDeeper]

GDay Fly,
I will love to ask some question to you from Italy...
I always loved Eucalyptus (for you, River Red) which, if you don't know it's present also in Italy (I think the name of Camaldulensis specie came from a place in Italy...)
Last year I planted some of them from seeds and obtained a great (for europe bonsai growth standards) results with 9 eucs in a box growing up to more than half a meter (2 feet) and one planted in a pot going over a meter (4 feet) in their first growing season (from April to end of september here).

However I had an hard and stressfull winter and left the plants alone for a couple of months. The ones in the boxe are irremediably gone, the other one was still having some leaves, half brown and half green, separated by a red line...
I repotted seeing an horrible tap root going up and down the rootbounded pot... I hope it will survive...

Anyway I will reboot my work from seed...

I have some questions:

1) Leaves:
Any success on reduction? Here they are long about 10-15 cm (4-6 inches) and with this size I will have an equilibrated bonsai only if I make an 1,5 meters tall one (5 feet)
2) Style:
I was immagine something more distant from Japanese styles with less movement, more upright and with some pollarding... Reflecting the Eucs I found here, but maybe this was because most Eucs here feel the intervent of man hands... There is no wild Italy... At least not with Eucs...
3) Soil and watering:
Given that in Italy the Eucs were used to be planted for bonification of swamp marshes I had assumed to use a soil which tends to remain wet, and water often.
But you said well drained... Maybe for air?
At the moment I had used 50-50 of peat and pomice which is the draining part. It is Italian bonsai entusiast preferred soil, like Akadama, but white, lot cheaper, and more stable in the time.
4)Threads:
It is easy to thread an Eucs?
Because I wanted to try also a trunk merging experiment...
5)Clima:
How is the weather in your part of the world? (Where Eucs are Native)
Can you describe your seasons ?(temperature, rain...)
Because here Eucs grows quite well outside in the ground, but I woul like to know if in a pot I will have frozing issues.
And also if it is possible I would like to grow one as Indoor bonsai. If the Eucs natively grow all year without a dormant period probably it is possible (if I found a well enlighted window)

Tank a lot to host me here,
Luigi

[shibui]

Hi Luigi,
We have not heard much from Fly for some time. Maybe I can help.

Climate: E. camaldulensis grows over much of Australia - from arid (almost desert) areas along rivers to cooler foothill country. summer temps to well above 45C through to winter min around -7C so these are pretty tough plants. I am not sure what the min temp would be for bonsai in a pot because there are few areas in Aust that get cold enough to freeze the pots.
They do like some moisture and are mostly found along rivers and can tolerate flooding for several months but will grow better with well drained soil as most bonsai.
You can expect some leaf size reduction in a pot but the best euc bonsai I have seen (even small leaved species) are larger trees about 1m tall. Euc as bonsai is new and some growers are experimenting with different techniques to find what works.
Thread grafting should work but very little work has been done with grafting eucs. Grafted trees have only been available in nurseries for about 5-10 years.
I think euc is better outside. I do not think anyone here would try keeping one inside because we have no reason. Again, you will be trying something new and results would be valuable for the Australian plants as Bonsai research team.

As far as styling goes red gum comes in all shapes and sizes but most aussies would think of a massive trunk dividing into several ascending branches with weeping tips (a bit like the 3rd pic here). For inspiration some pics of natural red gums:

Copy of Red gum beechworth.JPG

Copy of Red gum leaning Beechworth.JPG

Copy of Redgum bowna 1.JPG

Copy of Red gum - Meringo 1.JPG

Copy of Red gum Meringo 2.JPG

[GavinG]

Maybe photo 3 is the "normal", but photos 2, 4 and 5 are wonderful designs. Thanks for posting. Great detail.

Gavin

[shibui]

agreed Gavin,
Those last 2 pics are from a small redgum forest just inside the dunes on the NSW coast. The sea is only 50m to the left of those trees. Some of the trees were straighter and more 'redgum' like but most of the bigger ones were the most twisted and contorted eucs I have seen and an inspiration. Now, how to represent that in a bonsai

[PiledHigherandDeeper]

Hi,
I would like to aim to something like that:

The Eucs grown fast, but how much for a 6-8 inches trunk ? 6-10 years ?
But the real problem is how much tall it began before I can chop it with this size trunk? Maybe I will not have enough space...

[GavinG]

Neil wrote:

Now, how to represent that in a bonsai

It can be done with Callitris,

P1070327.jpg

-in the wild:

P1080848.jpg

it should be done with Casuarina,

P1070693.jpg

but I'm not sure that Eucs can take the intense wiring. The angles on FlyBri's wired branches were really good, but this is another level altogether.

(Dan Robinson does it....

P1080972_2.jpg

So let's see what we can do...

Gavin

[Neli]

Waw1 I like that! Every thing is kept to the theme ....and combined to a perfect expression of a suffering tree.

[Waltron]

I am planning to re-pot a River Red this week so I thought I'd revisit and bump up one of my favorite threads on the topic.
I haven't seen Flybri on here for a while, but if you're still around I'd love an update.

I look forward to seeing if I know what I'm doing.

[kcpoole]

I am planning to re-pot a River Red this week so I thought I'd revisit and bump up one of my favorite threads on the topic.
I haven't seen Flybri on here for a while, but if you're still around I'd love an update.

I look forward to seeing if I know what I'm doing.

Fly has not logged in in over a year

Keep us updated please waltron

Ken

[Waltron]

Hi Ken, I re-potted it last night. It's not much of a specimen, it's young (about 5 years from tube stock), ugly and unhealthy; I'm using it to experiment on.
Since I last re-potted it a few years back I've had very poor growth, the root growth was also poor and it had fungus (or something) in the roots which appeared to be repelling water. I had this water repelling fungal problem in a few of my pots over the last couple of years. So I removed about 2/3 of the roots, all of the soil and put it in a shallow nursery container in my standard bonsai mix (in which I have now substituted sieved potting mix (where I think the fungus originally came from) for mini pine nuggets).

Now would probably be an appropriate time to quote Fly as in my post above.

Time will tell.

[Jarad]

Those are some gnarly looking trees!

[EdwardH]

Good luck with the repot.

I really miss Flybri's posts, progressions and knowledgeable comments.