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Highlights from Michael Hagedorn’s garden
My recent trip to Portland began with a visit to Michael Hagedorn’s garden. His trees are looking great this time of year – the junipers are covered in new growth and the deciduous bonsai are full and...
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How vigorous are your pines?
We all know the basic signs that are our pines are healthy – dark green foliage and long spring shoots. Green growth on a 12 year-old pine Vigorous spring shoot There’s another clear sign that pines...
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Sei Boku Bonsai Kai’s 33rd annual exhibit
Last weekend, the Sei Boku Bonsai Kai held their 33rd annual exhibit at the San Mateo Garden Center in San Mateo, California. The event included bonsai displays, outdoor vendor area and demonstration...
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Review: Bonsai Intermediate Course
Last weekend, Bonsai Empire and Bjorn Bjorholm released a follow-up to the popular online Bonsai Beginner’s Course – the Bonsai Intermediate Course. Bonsai Empire provided me with access to the course...
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Great bonsai at Mirai
My recent trip to Portland included a stop at Ryan Neil’s garden. I’d last visited a year ago (see “Pines” and “Junipers” for details). This year I was struck by how different the trees looked before...
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Stimulating new buds on cork oak
My recent posts on cork oaks feature trees that were removed from the ground this past winter. The goal for those trees is to simply get healthy and develop strong roots so they can withstand further...
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Balancing vigor on black pine
The term decandling gets a lot of attention. Rightly so – it’s a key technique in the development of black and red pine bonsai. It’s the technique that helped me get from here: June, 2013 to here:...
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Pulling needles on black pine
Density is a key concept in bonsai. We want young trees to develop good density. With mature trees, we aim to maintain density. Density, it seems, rarely takes care of itself. Some of the young pines...
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Decandling a red pine forest bonsai
Although I’ve only posted a handful of explicit bonsai experiments, I tend to think of all bonsai work as experimental. We know what happens when we cut – some amount of foliage is removed from the...
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Cutback on Korean hornbeam
The 5th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition is just a few months away. The event will be held on September 10th and 11th in Rochester, New York – home to William N. Valavanis, the force responsible for...
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Summer work on black pine
For black pine growers, late spring and early summer offer a lot of opportunity for improving trees. Healthy pine bonsai in the refinement stage are decandled. Depending on needle density after...
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Watching bonsai become bonsai
If you have a lot of bonsai, you might feel like you’re doing assembly line work at certain times of the year. Summer, for those with a number of black pines, is one of those times. When I have a lot...
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All about akadama
What is Akadama? Akadama is a fundamental component of bonsai soil. It is used throughout Japan as a potting medium for both bonsai and general gardening purposes. More and more, it is used around the...
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What kind of bonsai fertilizer do you use?
I hear the question a lot – “What kind of fertilizer do you use?” The answer is a moving target. So far this year I’ve used various combinations of six different fertilizers. My go-to fertilizers...
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Decandling black pine bonsai – an overview
Now that decandling season is coming to a close, I thought I’d share an overview of the process taken from previous posts. Let’s begin with the obvious question: What is Decandling? There is a lot to...
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Developing Yaupon holly bonsai – a tale of when not to cut
Yaupon holly has been on my mind this week. I’m doing a demonstration on one tonight at a club meeting of the American Bonsai Association, Sacramento, and have been collecting notes on their care....
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Options for applying bonsai fertilizer
I’ve been enjoying experimenting with the new fertilizers I’m using this summer. Ten days ago I applied Omakase fertilizer cakes to a number of my trees and I’ve already noticed a few things. One of my...
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Repotting a trident maple bonsai
Several years ago, I published a series on how to repot bonsai. For those who missed it the first time, here is an edited version of the series in a single post. Enjoy! How to Remove a Bonsai Tree from...
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Bonsai buying guide: check the surface roots
Buying bonsai can be a lot of fun. Because it can be hard to find good material, when you stumble on something that has potential, it’s easy to get excited. How do you know when something has...
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What to look for in surface roots
Last week I wrote that it’s important to look for the surface roots when evaluating bonsai (see “Check the surface roots“). What is it that we’re looking for? We want to see the connection between...
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