This is a pretty little seedling Japanese Maple in an elegant Japanese pot with a crackle glaze and cloud feet. I don't remember the maker, if anyone recognizes the chop I would appreciate the info.
I believe this was part of a batch of seedlings that I collected from under a tree in the yard in one of the other members of my pottery studio. That was in 2019, so this is only 7 years old.
Anyone have a source for collected birch? Either paper birch or river birch?
Right now there is a special exhibit at the US National Arboretum on the Japanese art of Kusamono. One of the top kusamono artists in the US has one of her pieces on display using a pot that I made. I couldn't be happier.
How does your group handle after hours calls? Is it shared among providers? Or do you have a paid answering service company? If you pay for it, how much are you paying?
​ Edit - my group has shared call, it's a big group, so each doc has 1-2 nights per month. Often there are no calls, usually it's just 1-2, the most I've had was 5.
People are starting to complain about doing it, as we have lost a few docs so we will have an increase in the number of nights per doc. Just wondering what other options are out there.
Young Choe just sent me a picture of a kusamono she made using one of my pots, that is currently being displayed at a special exhibit at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum in the US National Arboretum in Washington DC.
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I couldn't be happier!
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My passion is bonsai, but I still work a regular job to pay the bills, and yesterday the 2 worlds collided. I was able to do a bonsai workshop with the doctors-in-training at the residency program where I am on faculty.
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We made bonsai jades, in a similar format to the bonsai bar workshops you may have seen advertised (by the way, that's a great program bringing lots of new people into the hobby).
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Everyone had a good time and they asked me to do it again next month for the new batch of interns that start in July.
Stopped at a bonsai shop that had these rocks with a channel carved in them, to make a rock planting that looks sort of like root over rock but it's actually "trunk through rock."
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You feed a sapling through the channel then grow it out until the trunk expands and fuses to the rock.
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I've included a pic of an already finished one that I bought from them, but thought it would be fun to make a few of my own as well.
Just potted up some little plants in my little pots
I've had this crazy tree for awhile now, the person who gave it to me did not know what kind it was. I've been thinking it was a pine, but looking at it more closely now, the new growth does not come out like a typical candle maybe it's not a pine, it could be a spruce?
The pic shows a new shoot on the left and 2 smaller newer shoots that have come out already after cutting a new shoot in half just a few weeks ago.
Hey I'm looking for a place to get in a river that's not going to be super crowded, I don't mind a bit of a hike to get there. Any recommendations?
If you have Japanese Black Pine, there's basically 2 times a year where major work is done. In the winter we do needle plucking and shoot reduction (you can see the post/article I wrote about that here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonsai/s/aDhQm0IhiL )
In the summer we do decandeling. Typically done from the beginning of June through the beginning of July, depending on the size of your tree and the length of your growing season.
Larger trees are done earlier, smaller trees are done later. We are doing this process to stimulate a second flush of growth, so how much time you have left in your growing season determines how long that second flush is able to grow. Doing your larger trees first will give you a longer second flush on those trees, saving the smaller trees till later in the season will ensure their second flush is smaller. Some people will even stagger the time in a single tree, removing some candles now and other candles a week or 2 later, to try to balance the size of all the candles. That's too much for me, I have so many trees I'd worry I might miss some candles, so when I decandle I remove every candle at the same time, so i know the tree is done.
The process is simple, you just cut off the candle - which is this year's new growth, right at the base, leaving a small stub, maybe 1-2mm. You can also do some needle thinning at the same time - removing some of the old needles in stronger areas of the tree. You want to try to balance the energy throughout the tree, removing more needles from strong areas, leaving more needles in weak areas.
Here's a few pics.
Pic 1 pre-decandeling
Pic 2 close up showing the candles - there's 1 large and several small ones
Pic 3 all candles removed from that location
Pic 4 branch with candles removed and needles plucked
Pic 5 decandeling done
By consistently applying this process we build more ramification each year, as you will get new growth at the cut site. This is only done on branches that are in the refinement stage - the primary branch is as thick as you want it to be, you are now working on developing a ramified pad.
This week I brought in my Arakawa Japanese Maple. The bark is so amazing. These tend to be harder to ramify, but it is slowly coming along. Today I did a partial defoliation (second pic is after) by cutting any extending shoots back to the first node and removing 1 of each pair of leaves at that node. This prevents further extension/thickening of the twigs and lets more light and air into the interior to help with back budding and keeping the interior growth alive.
Rakuyo had a good video on this last week.
I've been working on this one about 4 years now, started as an 8 foot tall tree from a regular landscape nursery. This is it's third wiring over that time. The basic structure is pretty much set now, just need to work on filling out the canopy over the next 2-3 years. Will transplant into a shallower pot this winter.
This week I've brought in another Scots Pine. I potted it up into one of my stretched/cracked pots this past winter, and it's been slow to extend its candles. I'll prob skip candle cutting this year unless they really take off later this month. It's getting some nice flaky bark.
I'm always on the lookout for new sources of nursery material for bonsai. I'm often hunting for unusual species, and on one of my online searches I discovered Kigi nursery. They have a very huge selection, their website was easy to navigate with lots of pictures, and their prices were reasonable. So I decided to order a few things.
Unfortunately the experience went downhill from there. I placed my order in March, and I didn't actually get it till May. They were very unresponsive in replying to my emails when I inquired about the delay.
I eventually did get the plants, the packaging was good, they arrived intact. However all 3 trees were grafted. Nowhere in any of the descriptions did it specify they were grafted. I suppose I should have anticipated that, given that it's a landscape nursery, not a bonsai nursery. Regardless, none of them will be usable for bonsai. But I should be able to propagate them by cuttings, so eventually I should have usable material.
So, overall, I would not recommend this nursery, unless you are specifically looking for a rare species to use as a source for cuttings.
Here's a few pots I got out of the kiln last week. Most of these would be accent pots, except the highest one and second lowest one would also work for trees. The clay body is called T2 (except for the nanban style which is black mountain), they are fired to cone 10 in a gas kiln.
I enjoyed the film, but I don't think it really works on IMAX. The curved screen distorted everything - made people look like they were leaning sideways when they were standing up straight. Other than that, it was enjoyable. Not as good as rogue one or andor, but entertaining.