Found Bonsai – Exceptional Trees from Humble Origins 4/10/17

Front left shot of a Privet (Ligustrum ovalifolium) that was collected in 2009 from an old hedge growing in West London. It belongs to Harry Harrington. The pot is by Victor Harris of Erin Pottery

Most of the bonsai we feature start with aged, often highly developed (usually expensive) stock. From there to a show-worthy bonsai might require mostly refinement. In other cases more radical styling might be  involved, but either way, when you start with superior stock, superior results are more likely.

Conversely, most of Harry Harrington‘s (author of The Foundations of Bonsai) bonsai come from more humble origins…

Continued below…

Harry Harrington’s
The Foundation of Bonsai

The cover of the North American edition of
The Foundations of Bonsai
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Here's where Harry started. If you hadn't seen the photo above, would you recognize the potential?

…Many of Harry’s trees come from stock dug up in various urban, suburban and rural setting around parts of the U.K. Most of this stock is rough and raw, and often far from looking anything like a bonsai.

The ramifications (sorry) for most of us are obvious. In most cases, our trees are from nursery stock or sometimes urban or suburban yamadori. Our challenges are much the same as Harry’s.

All the photos in this post come from Harry’s bonsa4me gallery

A closer look at Harry's carving

This photo and the one just below, were taken during Spring 2015 after the tree had been partially defoliated and pruned. As you can see, it has come a long way from the freshly dug little stump in the photo above, though it still had a long way to go when compared to the photo at the top of this post.

 

Here's Harry's caption for this shot, "Detail shot of the back of the bonsai I posted yesterday. Often times it is the below-soil part of an old Privet that is used for bonsai as this image illustrates.....the tree still has a stone (from the ground) embedded in its trunk."

 

Harry and his prized Privet. I was surprised when I saw this photo. I had been envisioning a larger tree.