I feel very fortunate to have happened upon two pines from a friend who has lost interest in pines (TimS). While he loves looking at great pine bonsai and admires great bonsai he has no interest in tending them as part of his collection. Indeed, he has lost so much interest in tending pines, that he now has a total of zero in his collection. Zip. Nudda. None. Tim's focus is now on deciduous and flowering varieties on Bonsai.
Now - I am no pine expert. I like them but I am scared of them. Petrified. They seem easy to kill. A few members of YVBS and Warragul and so many more folk have wonderful specimens. Ryceman3 got me interested through with his seedling project - so I purchased a bunch of his seedlings. And more recently, a wonderful presentation by Scott Martin of Bonsai Matsu at the Yarra Valley Bonsai Society inspired me.
As fate would have it - a range of events occurred - let's call it serendipity and I came into two pines from Tim. I am truly thankful to Tim. I'll do a seperate post about each.
I have called this Black Pine (Yatsubusa) "The 'Eff'd Pine". In short, the title reflects the history! That was the comment from the said prior owner when he cut the top off it and said well... "I eff'd it".
Use you imagination if you're not sure what this means. In short, it was destined for the bin. 
A photo arrived on my phone to see if I was interested. Here's the original photos.
When I got it home I thought maybe we can make a new top, maybe we can semi-cascade. Ok - so maybe there's options but I have no clue and no idea if now is the right time to play with the tree. Some may argue
but I know my limitations and I didn't want to further f'up the Effed' tree! With Scott Martin (Bonsai Matsu) https://www.bonsaimatsu.com at front of mind because of his recent demo at YVBS, I gave him a call and asked if I could call on his expertise. He's a busy bloke but after seeing a photo, the short answer was, yes.
Scott was brilliant. He is such a humble, kind and knowledgeable guy. He was generous with his time and over a coffee we discussed a range of options. A coffee turned into a workshop and away we went.
Here's where we landed. A few angles.
As a tree that was once destined for a sad end at the bottom of a bin, I am so happy with this as the start of a new life.
A couple of note is in passing.
My learning here is that one man's trash is another man's treasure. We all have different wants and ideas. I was lucky that Tim had fallen out of love with the species, was not spending much time on them and the timing was right. Further, difficult stock requires expertise; expertise that I do not yet have. I am so thankful that Scott was able to make time to see me and I look forward to future classes with Scott.
Who nows where "The Eff'ed Tree" goes from here but as someone new to pines, I feel fortunate to have this little tree and hopefully, by continuing to draw on the knowledge of experts - I won't kill it. Perhaps I can even make it into something quite lovely over time.
Be assured, Tim and I have been chatting about this tree for the past few weeks, I was a little uncomfortable in posting this but Tim was more than happy as it does show what can be done with difficult stock.
I am sure others may have taken the tree in a different direction or even not like the tree as it is ... for me, I love it and am thankful to Tim and to Scott too.
Cheers,
Mark
PS - My next post about my other pine will be shorter. I know, I ramble!
