Jan 25 2017

Hawthorn Winter Wiring

This Hawthorn has been with me a while. It’s one of the finer growth species and thus not quick to flower as a bonsai. I’m spending a little time to get the placement of primary, secondary right and then build a nice canopy of ramification. The aim with this one was always a natural image of a Hawthorn commonly seen in the Irish Landscape.

Before Wiring

and after

played about with the time lapse app on my new camera and was please with the results. Check out the video.

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Jan 24 2017

Berberis First Wiring

This berberis was ready for it’s first wiring. I wanted to give it a first wiring last year but it budded out before I got near it.

I wanted to make a few further decisions about trunk selection and get the basic branch structure going in the right direction. A very brittle tree to work with and covered in tiny thin thorns, painful. This was the result. Early days with this being it’s first sighting of wire but great potential going forward.

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For earlier posts on this tree see: Just acquired and Berberis Clump Repot

Seen here in 2014

Jan 22 2017

Steve’s Bonsai Garden

When I was over at Suruyama Towers the other week I had the pleasure of spending a few hours with Steve McKee who was visiting. Steve and I have a fair bit in common and it was good to get a walk around the trees and chat bonsai.

Steve picked up a nice Literati Scots Pine from Peter when he was there and I have been following what’s happened since on Steve’s Facebook page ” Steve’s Bonsai Garden”.

This is the Pine as bought.

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Steve has since worked on the tree with Paul Finch and this is the result. More photos over on his FB page.

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Steve has a fantastic collect of trees and and great garden layout.

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Well worth a follow over on Facebook to see more of his trees and follow his exploits around some of the exhibition in the UK.

Here’s a link to his page again to save you a search: Steve’s Bonsai Garden

Jan 15 2017

Steve’s Work

During my time with Mr Warren, Steve Salisian from LA was busy working away beside me. I thought I’d share his work here for you to see.

The first tree is a Sabina Juniper with great deadwood and movement.

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Portuguese Oak

Another Portuguese Oak

A raft style Yew

Japanese Maple

Thanks for adding to my experiences for the week Steve, look forward to catching up with you in LA in May. 🙂

Jan 14 2017

Sabina Juniper

Peter told me to pick something out to work on and I fancied a Juniper. With lots of great material to pick from both large and small, I opted for this Kifu sized one. I was left to figure out what options we had for the tree and if possible make it good from both sides. Most of Peter’s smaller (shohin) trees are good for either side, a great option for shohin display stands. Be nice to do the same with this one even at Kifu size. I gave the tree a preliminary clean up allowing me to study the trunk movement and branch structure a little more. Steve and I had a play around with it looking at a few possible angle changes both up and down. However what drew me to the tree in the first place was the angle it was at now. I gave my ideas to Peter just adding a possible tilt forward. I wanted to try and get two apexes on the tree but more separation was needed between the two main branches. As the lower one had shari, we opted to split the deadwood from the live vein a little to allow us to lower the branch further. A slightly risky procedure but fun. First Peter explained that before we carried out the split and bend that we should first look and see what other options we have if it goes wrong as a back up plan. There was a nice tree even if we lost the branch that was to be split.

The back..

and front…

Vein to be split from deadwood.

Making a start

Raffia applied

Wired up.

Initial bend put in place with an option to drop further if required.

Showing the amazing movement and twisting live vein.

During the wiring process

After wiring and lime sulphur was applied. Again the tree was not styled to look refined now. This is a Sabina with flower buds. As the foliage that is flowering now will die back when finished, we leave more of the fresher growth in behind to allow the foliage mass to be rebuilt later this year. There’s no point in fine wiring flowering areas when it will be removed within a year. What is important is the placement of the primary and secondary branches that will form the structure of the tree in years to come. A lesson learned from Peter all week – no point wiring what is being removed soon. An enthusiast may like to create the best image possible right now but is it good for the tree and a speedier development? No it’s not. Do what is required and move on to the next challenge. I still probably wired branches in this one that didn’t need it. A hard habit to break.

A check to see that it still falls within Kifu size.

It looks good from the other side too, but I forgot to take a photo 😦 A great tree to play with and I learnt a few things about Sabina along the way. Win Win.

Jan 12 2017

Reflection On a Great Week

Back home a few days now after a week away studying at Saruyama Bonsai. I’ve been giving some thought to all the little things that I learned in my time with Peter and also a few bigger things that are more concepts or approaches to creating bonsai. In all I think I got what I wanted from my time and I think Peter was happy with the work I did on his trees. I will now use what I’ve learned here to help progress Bonsai in Ireland and I hope to get back to Peter’s place again soon.

I’ve been through all my photos of the week and want to add them here as a reference for my work and also a memory of the good times had. I did a little posting when I had time during the week, usually in bed, but I’d like to be a little more comprehensive now I’m home. There’s a lot so I’m going to upload them as albums here and split them up over a few different headings. I’ll start with a few general shots from around the nursery.

Thanks to all those who I met at Peter’s place. It was great to work with Steve Salisian over from the United States and see his approach to bonsai, much of it gleaned from his sessions with Ryan Neil. Also to Jose, Steve and Les, who popped in for a few hours during my stay. Good to have time to actually chat to them rather than during the manic atmosphere at Exhibitions. And of course a big thank you to Peter, a great host, teacher and artist and Satomi who made me feel so welcome.

Steve McKee visiting for a few hours

Steve Salisian hard at work.

Jose stopping by for a cheeky beer after a hard days work.

Les spending a few hours with us on Monday, great to catch up.

And the boss, cheers Peter.

The rest of the general shots from the week….

Dec 31 2016

Cascade Japanese Black Pine

I finally got around to doing a little work on my new Shohin Japanese Black Pine. I picked this one up whilst on holiday in Tenerife back in October. A visit to Bonsai Centro Tenerife and a chat with Jose Acuna did the job.

This is it as purchased.

and after a little work.

A slightly different angle.

As a large shohin I like the fact that it has possibilities for reversing it in a box stand to fit different displays. Here’s the back.

and the other sides just for giggles.

Jose gave me a few earlier photos of it which I’ll share here too to keeps my records all in one place.

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Dec 30 2016

New Toy – Sony 6000

Santa was good to me, I have acquired a new toy and have been playing a little.

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I now have the Sony 6000 camera. My old Nikon D5000 had it’s limits were video was concerned and I was looking something for up coming holidays that was a little more compact. I’m no camera buff, I know what I need it to do to allow me to capture images and video for the blog, and this little fella fits the bill. I have a few add-ons to get my hands on but so far I am loving what it can do. Mirrorless cameras have really closed the gap with the DLSR range!

Dec 20 2016

Shohin Zelkova

This one is new to my collection this year. An old tree that originally was an import to the UK back in the late 80’s, it lost it’s apex when with the previous owner. I got the tree back in June as I saw some potential in making it into an even smaller shohin tree.

This was the tree as acquired. A bit weak with some dead branching. It hadn’t been fed much in recent years.

when I got it home.

I cut down the height by about 2 inches and cut the leggy branches back quite hard. After a few months free growth it had produced some new fine growth.

I was able to do a little wiring once it dropped leaves for Winter. This is it after work. Some branches left long and will be left for another year to thicken branches as required. New beginnings, we’ll see how it goes. Major repot required this Spring.

Dec 18 2016

Chuhin Japanese Maple

Catching up on a little blogging. I’ve missed a few trees in their Autumn garb. This was one. I like to add them here as my record each year. This one had a bad insect attach a few years back and I lost branches. I’m in the process of rebuilding the apex and ramification.