r/Bonsai

Here are a few pictures from our recent exhibit at the Connecticut College Arboretum’s black box theater!

Took a beginners bonsai class last weekend put on by our local bonsai society, this was the tree I recieved as part of the class. Golden Gate Ficus, not sure of the age. They walked us through an intro to basic trimming/shaping/wiring as part of the class.

This tree is exhibited at Chi Lin Nunnery, Hong Kong.
Sadly this is not my tree, but I did have the chance to work on it several times. Probably one of my favourite and very stunning transformation. Lmk if you have any questions.

I am not too sure how many years this is, I know the 4th image is about 5 years ago.

After ➡️ Before

First bonsai, shaped from a nursery boxwood. Before picture is just a stock photo as I didn’t take a photo of the original plant, but you get the general idea.

Middle photo is after the hard prune of about 90% of the plant, first photo is current with the new flush of leaves.

I’ve got a general shape, I think for now I’ll just leave it alone until next spring. I’d like to fill in the apex / canopy a little more, but that’ll take some time.

Have had this plant about a month or so.

Open to any tips from experienced boxwood growers!

Another one from Brussels I picked up Monday. Turned out ok for an initial styling

Is this schefflera too tall? 37cm from the soil surface and 38cm wide. Would the second photo be taking too much? Somewhere in between?

Hungarian goat horn pepper. 1 full pepper, tiny leaves

Pics are in reverse order

The trunk is about 4 or 5 cm at the base and it's 17cm up to that first branch where i did a chop last year. The new leader is about 1.5m tall. I planted this from seed around 2018 or 2019.

This year was time for some root reduction from a deep clay pot and into a much better medium. took a lot of tap root off to make the root system considerably shallower.

The roots were much more healthy than i expected, so I cut back quite a bit, confidence boosted by knowing that it's the right time of year and knowing it's going into a much better mix of crushed LECA, pine bark and perlite (my affordable development mix)

I went to the Mid American Bonsai Show at the Chicago Botanic Gardens on Sunday. I picked up a few pots but this was my “holy crap I need this” pot. I think it makes quite the composition! Let me know what you think!

This is my first ever attempt at a bonsai and I’m pretty proud of the results. Hoping for more girth in the trunk eventually. Thoughts and ideas welcome!

Wish me luck

Does anyone have any good literature about the care and/or care schedule for Bosnian pine. I enjoy unique things that are also a small challenge which this pine covers as well as seemingly being a great specimen that shouldn’t be too much work to get into something nice within a few years. A very rigid 2 needle pine that I could style similarly to a black pine or even mugo, but just with a larger shape due to its longer foliage. Cannot tell if grafted or not - either way trunk looks great.

Ryan Neil has great general pine lectures but I’m hoping to find something or someone that can help in this specific topic.

If it’s a stupid idea, I may consider returning the tree but I love the way it looks.

Thanks in advance for anyone who has any guidance.

One year on from last time I posted this tree. Like a little fruiting apple tree!

This is a very silly experiment I've been running to see how small I can reduce the compound leaves of one of my trees. Leaf from the parent tree and rooted cutting from the same tree (about 3 years in the tiny pot), leaf size has been consistently teeny tiny! Egg cup for scale.

My mother recently passed away, and she absolutely adored this tree, it turns bright Scarlet in the fall and is shaped like a bonsai. It’s so beautiful. My brother wants to cut it down so I’ve been trying to sell it, so that at least goes to a good home, but all the offers in my inbox are so insane that I think it simply will not happen. I’m not sure what to do. I live in an apartment and I can’t afford to keep it or move it, especially after all the fees of my mother‘s funeral, but we can’t give it away for free because if we list it for free that will not incentivize people to be careful with my brother’s yard. I wish there was a tree conservationist society or something that we could donate it to.