As you can see, this Japanese white pine has a strong, well-tapered trunk and nice balanced open branching. Most imported Japanese white pine bonsai have been grafted onto Black pine stock.* But this one was grown from seed. It was just wired (in this photo) by Michael Hagedorn (Crataegus Bonsai.) It belongs to a client of Micheal's.
Still on vacation, so it’s archives again. This one is from January 2013 with some value added.
The Japanese white pine (Pinus parviflora) is one of the world’s emblematic bonsai. In Japan, it and the Japanese black pine are the species most associated with the art of bonsai.
The Latin name for Japanese white pine is Pinus parviflora. The Japanese name is Goyo Matsu. Matsu is pine and Goyo means ‘five-needle’ (all white pines have five needles to a cluster). In fact, you will sometimes hear the name Japanese five needle pine used in place of Japanese white pine.
Root-on-rock Japanese white pines are not at all unusual. The more I look at this one, the more I am struck with just how well-balanced and tranquil it seems. This is to take nothing away from its natural and wild side. The photo was taken in Japan at the 2011 Sakufu-ten exhibition by Jonas Dupuich (Bonsai Tonight).
Fluidity and muscle combined make for a very strong bonsai. To my eyes this is a near perfect informal upright Japanese white pine bonsai. It's from Mario Komsta's facebook photos. My guess is that it originated in Japan and that Mario has been refining it. He calls it Goyo Kundo and though Goyo matsu is the Japanese name for Japanese white pine (see above). I couldn't find anything about Kundo in my dictionary or online, so your guess is as good as mine.
The famous 'Peace Tree.' I like the way this photo captures the lines and color in this famous Japanese white pine's bark. That's the upside. The downside is that there's no way to tell just how magnificently large and powerful this tree is. It resides at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum. We've featured it before. The photo is from Michael Bonsai.
Million dollar bonsai. Here's a mind-bending Japanese white pine that we featured back in 2011 with our original caption: This magnificent White pine was sold at the 11th Asia-Pacific Bonsai and Suiseki Convention & Exhibition in at Takamatsu, Kagawa, Japan, earlier this month. As you can see, the asking price was 100,000,000 yen (that’s close to 1.3 million dollars). I don’t know what the actual sales price was. Photo borrowed from Bonsai Tonight.
This flowing bunjin Japanese white pine provides a little contrast to the husky tres above. It's from our Masters' Series Pines: Growing and Styling Japanese Black and White Pines.
* Japanese white pine bonsai are usually grafted onto Japanese black pine stock, and all, or almost all of these grafts come from Japan. The reason for grafting is because black pines are more vigorous than the more delicate and finicky Japanese whites. This is especially true of White pine cultivars, many of which simply won’t thrive on their own roots (here’s more if you are interested).
Our Masters Series Pine Book
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