The 35^th Nippon Taikan Bonsai Exhibition runs from Saturday through Tuesday. I was fortunate to have the privilege to watch the judging all day on Friday, before the exhibition officially opened, and attend all day on Saturday and Sunday. A few of the trees changed a bit with the autumn coloring and some dropped their leaves as well. I learned a great deal during the past three days and saw many long time friends, both from around the world and Japan.

Japanese rose! I’ve never seen such a large s ize beautifully trained Japanese rose bonsai, and I’ve seen a lot. But was also surprising is that this award winning bonsai, (best deciduous bonsai) did not have a “proper” display table. OK, so someone made a wooden box and covered it with purple cloth, I can understand that. However it is too SHORT for the long cascading branch which is touching…