One of the most pleasing things I have seen in bonsai in the last few years has been the growth and transformation of the club I belong too. The Northern Ireland Bonsai Society has been around since 1986, but the last few years has seen a swing to workshop based meetings and a drive to bring in knowledge from bonsai professionals to boost the knowledge of all members.
This year is shaping up to be a great year. We have Peter Warren coming over in September, Robert Porch next month and we are delighted to be entering into our third year of our Willowbog Bonsai School. We also are breaking new ground with our exhibition moving to a new location and date this April.
One of my favourite blogs Centro Bonsai Tenerife had some photos of the awards from this years Kokufu Ten
And this Japanese blog has some interesting shots from the green club.
I always like to post a few other bonsai blogs from time to time to show what else is on offer if you look for it. It’s especially good if you can find active blogs with regular quality posts. Here are a few that are active at the moment.
Danny Use at Gingko is posting some great stuff at the moment and pretty much on a daily basis. I especially love his posts showing trees developing over a number of years. If you haven’t checked it out yet, go back through the older postings. Just click on the image below to visit.
Next up is a blog from Tomas Kovsca, in Slovenia. Language shouldn’t be a barrier to bonsai. I use Google Chrome as a browser to translate text within a post. It’s not perfect, but good enough to follow the meaning of a post topic. Again click on the image below to link to this blog.
I just have to promote Mr Warren again by way of encouraging him to keep up the postings from Japan and elsewhere on his worldwide trips. He’s a very unassuming chap who does little in the way of self promotion. His work speaks for itself, so perhaps promotion isn’t required! I personally hold him in high regard, just don’t bloody tell him I said it 🙂 Click image below to view link.
Next up is Dylan Fawcett’s very educational blog Bonsai Prelude. Some great posts with plenty of reading too.
The first bonsai blog I ever followed Kingii, in Spanish but a very active blog with some stunning trees being produced. This is why Spanish Bonsai is ahead of the game in Europe. Also the El Tim or The Team linked closely with Kingii is worth following.
One of my favourites is Bjorn’s Bjorvala Bonsai with regular posts from Japan and not to mention the Video Series Bonsai Art of Japan. well worth a follow.
I have to finish off with Peter Snarts Willowbog Chat blog. I have a vested interest in it as I helped Peter get it set up but Peter has embraced the blogging concept and is always adding good quality and informative posts. Well worth subscribing too for the regular updates.
That should keep you going for a while 🙂 All images above are links. I have come across a few new start up blogs lately. Once I see the posts pick up, I’ll share them here too. Share the love people 🙂 If you like what you see, why not follow the blog by signing up for notifications by rss, email etc. This will act as encouragement for all and we’ll see even more posts.
If you are not currently following Peter Warren’s blog posts from the Green club and Kokufu Ten, then you should be.
with his usual pithy comments he has been showing us some interesting bonsai both in the exhibition and also on the sales tables at the club.
Here is a selection of the photos he been posting.
On our trip over to Willowbog and also on our way back we popped into Mike’s place for a look around his trees. Mike is an old mate from bonsai days past and after a break from the hobby for a few years, he jumped back in with both feet.
You’ll have seen Mike in the photos of the Sunday workshop. Hard to miss, a long haired biker covered in tattoos. Here’s some of the photos I snapped on the way out and the way home.
and then is was me 🙂
As previously posted, I had opted to work on this Scots Pine.
Ryan asked about its history and what way I saw the tree going. I pointed out it’s problems as I saw them, namely the roots, heavy branches in the apex and the position of the secondary trunk in relation to the main trunk.
After a look Ryan suggest that the tree be tilted to the right to change the level of the roots and solve the nebari issue. One root can be removed at repotting. He removes a few heavy branches and started me off wiring the mini apex on the right and the secondary apex in the middle with heavy wire. This allows us to change the angle of the secondary trunk more to the front.
Ryan impressed me greatly by his ability to move around the room keeping everyone on target at the right time and make adjustments when required. Peter Warren is the only other person I have seen manage this. Must be something to this Japanese apprentice carry on 🙂
As I moved around the tree wiring Ryan was able to point out a few different techniques in wiring. That 45 degree angle thing you read about in all the books and hear preached by most bonsai guru’s can be safely shelved especially when wiring with copper. I haven’t done a lot of copper wiring, strange after 18 years in bonsai, but I found it OK to be honest. Gauging the weight of the wire was the new bit for me but a few branches in, it was straight forward. Towards the end of the workshop Peter Warren stepped up and gave me a hand to get all the wiring complete on time. Cheers Peter 🙂 It was a good chance to chat about …. nah I’ll keep that conversation to myself 😀
Throughout the workshop, Ryan would appear and do a little placing of branches or adjust branches that I had placed. Then at the end he sat down to make the final adjustments. I think the whole feeling of the workshop is captured in these next photos, just look at all the smiling and laughter, a great day in good company but still achieving quality work.
Grinning like a complete eejit 🙂 why the hell not, working with Ryan Neil. Peter Warren and Peter Snart, hard to beat it I think.
and the final image
As usual the photo just doesn’t do it justice.Here is a side by side before and after.
Those left at the end got together for a wee memento photo. Good times.
It would appear that Mr Warren is teasing us with live posts direct from Kokufu! He will probably stop now that he knows folk are looking, he’s fickle that way 😀
If you’re interested, click on the image blow to link to his blog post.
Starting with Phil’s tree, this rather large Scots Pine was selected by Phil for a particular reason. Most people who had done the workshop wanted direction with their tree or refinement. Phil however was more interested in learning techniques, most notably bending techniques. This Scots Pine was always going to need bending in some way to make it a viable bonsai sometime in the future.
This is the tree before we started.
Ryan asked for ideas about its future, some said put it back in the ground and one said put it back in the van 🙂 Ryan said that there is always something that can be done.
After some discussion about styling options with everyone there, Ryan opted to remove two of the trunks initially and set Phil to work creating jins using hand tools and a bit of rip and tear.
The next step was how to bend such a heavy branch/trunk. Ryan demonstrated the technique of sawing into the trunk and removing a very small wedge. This was then bend down to meet again and sealed. This was done in two places on the trunk.
Phil describes what the top of the jin looks like.
The branch that was to make the new apex also needed a severe bend. Ryan removed some of the thickness by creating a shari and then running copper wire along the length of the shari before Phil applied the raffia. This allowed the branch to be bent at almost 90 degrees.
Phil gets on with wiring the remainder of the tree.
Ben lends a hand with the wiring.
Ryan’s guy line setup.
Feck’n eejits the pair of them. Apologies if you find them offensive, but you try getting a photo of them without Phil the fingers getting his way!!
The spare branch which was under consideration as an apex is now jinned.
and after Ryan places the branches as a skeleton of it’s future design.
The wire team
It fitted in the van a lot easier on the way home 🙂
and just to prove it made it home….
before and after..
While at Willowbog I took some photos of Peter’s own collection and some sale trees over the 3 days. Not an easy task in heavy snow. I even took a few several times as the snow changed during our stay.
Here’s a gallery.
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