This strange and wonderful monster resides at Ryan Neil’s International Bonsai Mirai, but the photo is from Aarin Packard’s Capital Bonsai blog. Most of Aarin’s posts are from the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum, but this one is from a recent visit to Bonsai Mirai.
Conspiracies? I probably should have titled this ‘what happens when bonsai artists visit each other’ but my guess is Bonsai Conspiracies got your attention. No matter, it was inspired by four notable bonsai artist/bloggers getting together (in two sets of two).
Artisans Cup postponed until 2015. There’s another theme at play here; two of artists featured in this post work and live in the Portand Oregon area (Michael Hagedorn and Ryan Neil), and, as it turns out, both Michael and Ryan are prime movers of the Artisans Cup. So this seems like a good time to mention that the Cup has been postponed. It was originally scheduled for the fall of this year but has been rescheduled for the fall of 2015. I’m a little disappointed, but I think it will be well worth the wait.
This is a Douglas fir that belong to Ryan Neil. You don’t see that many Douglas fir bonsai so I got a little excited when I saw this one (Doug firs are among the tallest and most magnificent trees in the world). The photo was taken by Aarin Packard on his visit to International Bonsai Mirai. Aarin’s original might be a better photo, but I wanted to get a little closer for more detail so I cropped and enlarged. My apologies for the fuzzy effect.
This is from one of two Bonsai Tonight posts on air-layering a Hinoki (here’s the other). It’s actually Michael Hagedorn (Crataegus Bonsai) doing the work and Jonas Dupuich (Bonsai Tonight) taking the photos (Michael was visiting Jonas). One reason I wanted to show you this is what Jonas wrote about this poking technique “Michael then poked holes on the lowest part of the bark just above the layer line as an additional technique to stimulate new roots.” I must confess that I didn’t know about this and I’ll take a wild guess that maybe one or two of you were equally ignorant (no offense intended).
Here’s another tree that you don’t see very often. It’s a Texas cedar elm (Ulmus crassifolia) that’s from this years’ American Bonsai Association Sacramento show. The photo is from Bonsai Tonight (it has nothing to do with Michael’s visit).
When the sun came out this morning, I remembered why I live in Vermont. This iPhone photo is from my backyard and has nothing to do with today’s theme.
I’d never heard of poking holes in the lowest part of the bark just above the layer line to stimulate new roots either!
Wow, your place looks beautiful Wayne – thanks for the pic!
Thanks Jonas,
Much of Vermont looks this way this time of year. The truth however, is that this time of year lasts for but a fleeting moment.
Hi Dennis,
My guess is this is something Michael picked up during his apprenticeship in Japan.
The only other time I can remember an advocacy for “Poking” like that was when I lived in Florida in the late 70’s and one of the mentors in Clearwater mentioned it as a way to encourage back budding on old wood. I had forgotten that tidbit.
Hi Zack,
Have you used it to encourage back budding?