ok bro ... haven't got the time to snap photos. Just 2 weeks i have been actively jaga-ing my shui mei after so many years. I feel so malu. But luckily they made it till today. If not i will feel damn regret for bring back the seeds and plant them

But just a quick question, since i just repot them and it's actually a deep pot and i just realized if we want to train them, we need to put them in a shallow pot/smaller pot? How i wish i found this thread much earlier!

Welcome Jootat,

If i'm not wrong, we plant them in a deep pot until we get the bonsai material we want, trunk size..etc.. then we repot to bonsai shallow pot by pruning the root for training.
Trunk and nebari first , then the upper part, branches and shape/style later when you got a good base.

Am i rite Bonsailelong?

thx bro, may be i will just snap a photo for one of the plant that i have now, then may be u guys can give me some suggestion. Learn from you guys!

Hi, newbie at bonsai here.

Just purchased a maple bonsai during the weekend and was wondering if there is any sifu who could guide me on how to take care of this bonsai?

My bonsai the leaves seems a bit wilted. I'm putting it indoors currently, will be shifting it to outdoors on weekends cause weekday no one to take care of it.

Wow ! Zebal

That's the idea.

Hi Rmage,

Welcome !

Maple, absolutely no indoor.

Put it outdoor in the condition more or less like the nursery that you bought.

Just water and no fertilizer yet. Let it get use to your environment first.

Maple is template climate tree, it need at least one month of cold season for hyphenation and grow again.

Usually a half sun condition is suitable for it for adjustment in our climate.

Best of luck to your maple.

Please kindly post your bonsai photos for our sharing.

Hi Zabel,

I think we are doing well in this forum, maybe the editor should thanks us.

Let's keep it up!

O.. ok.

I'll shift it outdoors later. Hopefully it won't die on me.

Just watched this documentary last Sunday, on a Bonsai sifu called Shinji Suzuki.
Great inspiration you can get from this . But most of the great Bonsai here is more to Japanese black pine , or the 5 needle pine which are truly beautiful.
One more thing is a giant 7000 years tree there in Japan.
WOW!!



A great 50 min spend for this.

hi all, looks like this forum got lots more ppl now... cny coming, back home to vote, back home to bonsai !!!!... keep it up guys...

That's the trees that we could hardly grow here.
But I did know somebody who was in Japan before brought back some Black Pine seeds and successfully
germinated and growing well.

Hope he can share his experiences on this forum.

This post has been edited by Bonsailelong: Feb 5 2013, 04:13 PM

Going thru' my computer on some of the old photo files and found something that I wish to share out.

Wrighthia Religiosa "shui mui"

back in 2009 Nov....





Last Saturday..... 50% stage. Still got lots of improvement to do.

This post has been edited by Bonsailelong: Feb 5 2013, 10:30 PM

And this, Zabel is taking very good care of it.



Back in 2010 March...

My wife bought this a few months ago, dunno what type of pine is this, but it refuses to grow upright. My friend told me this type of pine is call 'sleeping pine' it grows sideways only.... oh is this true?? so any idea how to train it to be a bonsai?



This post has been edited by g400g400: Feb 6 2013, 07:21 AM

I got this from ibonsai forum about japanese black pine,

"
about 20 years later, and from seed [ Japan, a gift pack posted to me,] I would say no. Additionally, a German guy also told me that the Japanese Black Pine grows all the way down onto the beach in Japan. You may wish to check and see if the Japanese Black Black wasn't originally a Chinese Black Pine and if it came from the coastal area of South China.

What may give you problems is translating the training information from Japan to tropical conditions and responses.

I have several pines and every year add on a few more seedlings, just to keep figuring out the training technique.

I live in the Caribbean, and we have a pronounced dry season from January until around May, growing cooler by October until say February[ lowest normal night temperature 19 deg.c and lowest recorded temperature 15 deg.c ]
Daytime is a standard 30 -> 33 deg.c as summer comes on.
Breezy island.

Soil mix is mostly crushed silica sand [ 70 % ] and compost. Testing the use of crushed, porous, eartheware red brick, from our local brick factories. Gives excellent drainage.
Growing containers are simple, peasant made earthenware lowfired red brick round flower pots, up to 16 inches wide [ 41 cm ] and 5 to 6 inches deep [ 12 to 15 cm ]
Placement full sun with a light zephyr.

See if you can contact Leo de Leon [ Manila ] as he is also growing Black pines.

Hope this helps.
Khaimraj

"

I think i would buy some seed and just try out, the seed are about rm20 for 5+ seeds. anyone want to try together?

hmmm... interesting, can try... but waiting for 20years... OMG i will be 'ah kong' oledi... btw, u buying the seeds from ebay?

ok, here it goes for two of my bonsai first. Hope to hear some suggestion/advice.

1 i bought it from semenyih nursery and another one is i planted from seed at least 7 years ago.


This one i bought it from the nursery last weekend. Initially it was botak. But now the leave starts to grow leow.


My fail bonsai ... And yesterday i accidentally hit the tree and it got out from the soil. I think i will need to push the soil harder tonight when i go home. Yesterday night was too late and too tired when i accidentally hit it. I know this is a very messy one, and trust me, i got some even worse than this

Hi Zabel,

That sound like a good idea.
No harm trying only rm20.
Do u think u can order together for me.
PM me your Bank A/C no. or I udang u for a while till I come down to Melaka
or till the beginning of next month when g400 flys over here.

Hi Jootat,

If I'm not wrong the first photo of "shui mui" you bought is from Sanfong. I've seen quite a lot of this shape there.
It's already 80% done, However I suggest you look into the wiring at the main trunk. Any sign of "eating in", if so
unwire only the main trunk wires.
Another suggestion is that don't put any stone or rock above the soil, in a long run, the weight of the stones or rock is not only
compacting the soil but will also result uneven grow of roots which in turn affect uneven grow of foliage.

For this one which you trained yourself, You are doing a good work.
I suggest you give it a little touch up.



Re pot your " shui mui" in a higher pot, plant it vertical, cover the small exposed roots, leave the big one exposed.
cut the big branches indicated in order to give your tree a balance look. Then cut the top layer of branches shorter, let it have a cone shape image,
wire and pull the lower level of branches a bit lower and let it grow for sometimes before doing further improvement.

This post has been edited by Bonsailelong: Feb 6 2013, 09:52 PM

Hi g400x2

The specie you have is actually a type of shrubby juniper called Juniperus Procumbens.
In Chinese it's called "sleeping pine" but it's not a pine specie.
This specie of juniper is not a good material for bonsai. It's only "interested" in growing
thin, long and side way. And for it's trunk it could hardly grows up to 1.5 ins in diameter
no matter how long you grow it. But to train it to become a thin trunk medium size bonsai is quite easy.

Here is my suggestion for you juniper procumbens. Up root your tree carefully, use a sharp cutter
cut the tree into 2 as indicated with each part with root attached. Plant them in separate pots so that you got 2 plants now.
This specie has very tough life, as long as you don't cut away any roots it will grow.
Let them grow for 2 months to recover then you can start you initial shaping to both of them.

The one sloping downwards i suggest you shape it into a cascading or semi cascading style.

For the other one maybe you can try to shape like these.

or

These 2 juniper procumbens of mine are still under training. I am not so happy with their shapes and hope to improve further one day.