Walter’s Massive Forest & Other Hornbeam Bonsai 2/24/17

This massive Hornbeam forest belongs to Walter Pall. Walter doesn't mention the variety in his gallery section (you might be able to hunt it down on his blog), but given that Walter lives in Germany, You might guess that it's a European hornbeam (Carpinus betula), but I wouldn't take it to the bank.

The other day someone asked if we would do something on Hornbeams, so here it is, the beginning of a series on the Hornbeam genus (Carpinus). And in case the person who asked is actually reading this (or anyone else is interested), our archives contain several Hornbeam articles.

We’ll start with a couple quotes from our long time friend Bonsai Mary… “Hornbeams, with their showy fall color, alternating leaves and interesting ‘flowers,’ make great bonsai subjects. They are deciduous and  by their nature they grow straight.  Therefore, they are best suited to formal and informal upright styles.”

Continued below…

 

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 This should give you an idea of just how large the Hornbeam above is. That's Walter by the way. I borrowed the photo from Mary.

This Hornbeam resides at the U.S. National Bonsai and Penjing Museum. This photo is also borrowed from Bonsai Mary. There's no mention of the species, and I'm on deadline, so you'll have to do your own research (though I know if Felix Laughlin reads this, he'll let me know).

This is not the first time we've shown this magnificent full fall color Korean hornbeam (Carpinus turczaninowii or coreana*). Actually, I suspect we've shown all the photos in this post before, I'm just too lazy to hunt them down. We originally borrowed the photo from Bill Valavanis' blog.