I repotted this one with a friend during a one to one session last week.
It had been in this pot for a long time and had been potted in peat by the previous owner. When we got it out of the pot the smell was grim, a stale rotting smell. The pot was also holding a lot of water. There had been no mesh over the drainage holes and we found holes leading up into the root mass and a few slugs gorging themselves.
This is it much later and into a smaller pot.
… in the garage 🙂
Some friends came over last night to do a little tree work, mostly repotting, well, that’s not true, it was mostly banter and craic 😉
You heard it here first, Jim Carey is starring in a new horror movie where he uses a Makita Die Grinder to hollow out the insides of unsuspecting bonsai enthusiasts heads. He infiltrates clubs and gains the confidence of members. He is even know to gain a seat at the committee table before he strikes 🙂
Ok, not true, but Ben does look like Jim Carey and this photo of him carving in my garage last Saturday is pretty darn scary 😀
Ben was here to play with my carving tools and gain a little experience using same. He spent most of his time on a raw material pyracantha stump but also managed a little work on an Elm and a Lonicera clump.
Stephen came down to give me a hand removing wire from a Larch I have and to make sure Ben behaved.
Always good when you remember to put a towel down to stop copper wire getting into the potting mix.
I played about with a raw Collected Scots Pine. I wanted it to resemble some mature trees near where it was collected. It will take a few years to fill and develope but I think it will make a nice image. Nice bark and better character than the photo shows.
This was the lonicera stump that Ben carved. First photo from a few months back.
An enjoyable afternoon.
I always like to do one of these to look back on. Good times…
That’s Munster not Monster!
Phil and I travelling down to Cork City on Friday, roughly 300 miles. The Munster Bonsai Club is only up and running 5 months and is keen for new members and hope that by bringing us down for regular sessions that we might attract a few others to the club.
Plans were for a meeting on the Friday night were Phil would do a little demo on a Scots Pine showing a few techniques while I worked my way through some of the members trees doing a critique. Those attending on the Friday brought plenty of trees to chose from and we had a great night. It was obvious that the guys there are totally in love with bonsai, many of you already know that feeling. When people start talking about trees, you could feel the buzz in the room.
After the meeting we travelled home with Piotr our host for the weekend. He lives 50 minutes away by his driving standard 😉
On our return to the club for the workshop on the Saturday I was delighted to see everyone there and raring to go on time. We always start with each workshop participant picking one main tree for the day to discuss before we begin actual work on the tree. This way everyone can learn for everyone elses tree. We had a real mixture of trees to work with from large raw pines to a small Hinoki Cypress. We also covered a few other topics as a spin off to the tree critiques like repotting and feeding.
As time moved on we all got working on trees and again the enthusiasm showed in their application to the tasks at hand. In some cases one tree was enough while others were able to work on several during the course of the day. It’s important to state that work done was what was best for the tree on the day, not trying to achieve a finished image, the only target for the session was maximum learning and I think that was achieved. We managed this while having some great craic in the process.
I would like to thank Piotr, Adam, Matt, Mark, Ray and Peter for making the day so enjoyable. Your openness to having two eejits from the North cut lumps out of trees was truly inspiring.
A full run down when I actually make it back up the road but while I’m stealing Piotr’s neighbours wifi signal I thought I’d do a quick post about our weekend. New friends, great times , good craic. Can’t wait to do it again 🙂
Ok, not quite as good an option as Noelanders 😀 but as far as pushing bonsai in Ireland, this is an important step.
Phil and I are taking the drive down to Cork on Friday to spend the weekend with some of the chaps from Munster. I think we even have a few ‘blowins’ from other areas too! I have only met a few of those attending, some I know from chatting via the blog and from Bonsai Ireland Hub. I’m looking forward to making some new friends and helping share knowledge about this great hobby. It’s a bit of a drive down:
I’ll do my best to keep you up to date with our exploits , but that will depend on my wifi access over the weekend! Sadly once I cross that grey line on the map my network disappears! Hopefully this will be the first of many events and fingers crossed we can get a club up and running in Dublin asap.
This is a Cotoneaster that Stephen brought to my place a few weeks agao to do a little carving and eventually restyle. It had lost two weak branches at the back and was placed into this tub to regain vigour for the last year. This seems to have worked.
Stephen cover this session on his blog HERE
Yesterday afternoon Stephen came back to do the wiring and styling. We also did a little more carving. This was it before we started wiring.
After some wiring this is the image that Stephen preferred for the tree.
I found this older photo of it from back in 2011
Those of you who are mad enough to check my blog daily, and are therefore as mad as me for updating it daily, will have noticed that I have skipped a few days. Well, it’s Christmas, and lets face it, things in the bonsai world have slowed down. However, I am endeavouring to get back on track with my posts.
I had a great/quiet Christmas at home with my family as this snap of an evening in front of the TV shows. Dinner over, fire lit, candles burning, tree lights illuminating, cosy or what 🙂 All that’s missing from this photo is the two dogs who are normally fighting with my son for the spot in front of the fire.
As most of you know I usually have bonsai friends around on the last Friday of the month to play with trees. However December is always a bad month to have one of these evenings as folk don’t want to come out into the dark, wet and very very windy night. I was chatting to Phil and Stephen, my two bonsai muckers, and the idea was floated for a smaller gathering but this time in the afternoon. After a quick email to a few friends it soon became apparent that some people were desperate to get out of the house lol.
I got the garage set up and ready to go.
Now at this point you will be expecting a photo gallery of all that went on… Well guess who was having so much fun that the camera hardly came out?! Yep, me. I have a few trees shots which I will share over the next few days, but very little else. I know Stephen had his camera with him as the flash was going off in my face a lot 😉 I’m hoping he has some nice photos over on his Bonsai Baker blog soon. But knowing Stephen……
In the meantime I will keep linking too and reblogging anything I find of interest about bonsai on the net. It saves you lot having to look anywhere else 😛
Hope you are all having a wonderful holiday.
Myself and Phil are on our travels in January all being well. We are popping down to Cork, Munster, to run a demo and workshop with the newly formed Munster Bonsai Club, part of the bonsai Ireland group. I’m really looking forward to it.
If you are viewing from Ireland, please give Piotr a shout and get booked in, even just for the Friday night perhaps. It’s so important that we all support him and Adam with the new club. Everyone has been crying out for one for years, now it’s here it needs to grow and your support is vital. If this workshop is a success then other will be planned for later in 2014.
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