AusBonsai

Hi Guys,

I've had this trident maple sitting since last jan which i haven't been happy with the root system or soil its currently sitting in , and as spring is well on its way its time to give this one a repot.

The question is how aggressive can i be in untangling and cutting back the roots?
The roots in yellow i was going to cut back as well as the outer roots while then flat bottoming it.

I was planning on cutting back the roots quite heavily placing on a tile and trying to develop a more radial root structure over the next couple of seasons and only cutting back lightly the branch structure as i was going to take some air layers over spring etc

if someone could weigh in with the best way to proceed that would be great and i get get the ball rolling.

Dan

You can certainly cut back the roots to where you want.

Bare root, get rid of the old soil and pot up

Ken

Being a Trident, I'd take off anything you want! I also noticed a couple in the second pic that cross over the others, you might want to take them off too. Tridents can handle some pretty aggressive root work (check out Shibui's thread on trident root pruning!)

Search for shibui post on tridents, might inspire you to go a little harder with the scissors!

Hi baddabing888 ,
I would simply remove all the unsightly roots around the base seen here , which is pretty much all of them . Wash the root mass with a hose on high and rake them out of cut back to untangle . Search the base for the best position to rebuild the new narebri . If you wash out and trim hard or strip the top roots you may find a better narebri under the soil . I have completely stripped the entire root mass off tridents 5 years running it will slow the growth but poor roots are poor roots

When you have found the best position plant back and fill above that desirable place on the trunk . Tridents will produce numerous new roots in and around the base at the ground level . If you find a good position lower in the root mass the base will be bigger and hopefully better than when you started .

Best of luck with this one . Any chance of a pic of the tree itself

Cheers Alpine

I totally agree with alpineart.
I repotted a few Tridents earlier this month and it was a matter of working down the trunk to an area that had the best radial roots and cutting everything above and below.
Two weeks on, all have started budding vigorously. Those with this done last season, it was just a case of trimming the roots that grow directly downwards.
This gave prebonsai with lovely radial roots that all start at or around the same level on the trunk.

I am down in Melbourne and I wouldn't be doing the same thing now that the buds have extended and opened.

Hi Thanks guys sounds good to me,

looks like root work in the order of the day.

I've attached a pic of most of the tree, it literally just broke buds yesterday and today, does this mean i have missed the boat? or should it still be good to go?

Hi All,

I did some root work yesterday and mostly got rid of the terrible soil that it was sitting in which is a positive.
I wasn't as brave with the scissors as i wanted to be but i can cut further back next year and i did manage to untangle a huge mass of roots and get a much better radial root spread to try get better nebari going.

I'm a bit confused as some roots appear to no radiate out but have basically formed as if it was part of the trunk like the photo below.
If someone with more experience could chime in for future reference what would you do with that lump of roots to the left hand side in the photo above?

bit less tangled more radial
Out of the pot
To my surprise it was already sitting on a matt / tile which was good news so it just needs to be trimmed / untangled around this

Hi badabing888 , I hope you cut that shade cloth out of there , it is definately not needed in root mass production or refinement . With the last pic I would go harder and cut all the thick roots off and start a fresh with the finer roots . Try to cut them off facing down so the new roots produced grow down . You won't kill the tree taking more off, but you will give it new life , after all its a Trident Maple .

Cheers . Alpine

Hi there
There is no way the nebari will improve when the surface roots are exposed above ground level like that. I'd bury the nebari to stimulate more feeders to grow from the thick roots and the base of the trunk. When that happens, u can then cut the thick and straight roots back to finer roots closer to the trunk. As Hirotoshi said " we need taper in the roots as well".

Best regards

Thanks guys.

i certainly cut out the shade cloth , which was a job in itself, ive also cut back further, i've planned to do again next year and target the other roots once i've got some healthy growth and new roots on the ones i did cut back heavily in the new soil mix.

@bonsaisensation thanks i buried all the roots i only left them exposed at this stage for the photo.

Hopefully it powers on and i get some more root / trunk growth and my air layers take =o)

cheers

Daniel