Ryan with his demo tree at the Portland airport.

When Ryan and I realized we’d be flying down for the Lone Star Bonsai Federation convention on the same day, we booked the same flight for some chat time. Getting to the airport was a story in itself. I got a text at midnight from Ryan saying that he was bringing his demo tree and that the box was big and awkward, and could I wait for him at the airport to watch over the box while he parked. By some miracle we met there the next morning within two minutes of each other coming from remote parts of Portland.

A workshop moment- photo courtesy Christopher Scholz

The Texas convention was a glory. One of the tightest organizing teams we’ve ever seen, the LSBF folks were stellar, and they also put together a nice display with some thoughtful trees. Kathy Shaner was presenting there as well, and I’d not seen her for a while. It was an extra plus to have some nice talks with our pioneering bonsai artist.

In addition to a few things about bonsai, the Portland Bonsai Village team offered our hard-won knowledge that included the toilet roll mystery, the squid gut story, the how to hide a holly from your master story, and the oddity of an Andre Agazzi mohawk on an old ginko. If you’ve not the faintest idea what I’m talking about you obviously should have been there.

In the future we’ll be looking for roadies to carry monstrous boxes. Groupies welcome. Sanity optional.

Second…or third… demo tree of Ryan’s. Photo: Christopher Scholz.

The pot was a prototype of one I made for a few years in the last part of my potting career. It ‘s hard to use, actually. Come to think of it, I made a lot of barely useable pots like that around the periphery of my usual work, exploring the boundaries of containers. Very few trees would work in this one, and this wisteria is not really one of them. But it was the closest I had to the right size and height. The form is a bit too strong for the wisteria, and the color does not really support the tree either. With having said all that I probably should not post this! But the flowers are nice, eh? Ignore the pot… enjoy the flowers!

So… having admitted the problems here, I’ll issue a challenge: What pot would work here? Give it a think, and send me some pot images to my email (please keep them smallish, not over 500 kb) and I’ll post them and we’ll review your ideas!

Although the pot is not quite right for this Chinese wisteria, I tried to make it more playful by turning the square form 45 degrees so that an edge would face front.

When we decided to graft on it I did warn my client that I was not sure of our success because the stock was weak. I think we did about 8 veneer grafts with itoigawa scions and 6 took. So we were happy and a bit surprised. What happened following that was even more curious.

I should say that we did not graft to get rid of the scale but to get rid of the bad foliage type. I do wish I had earlier photos of this so you’d be more likely to believe me, but none of the itoigawa grafts ever got scale. Not a single one. The itoigawa was even touching the infested original foliage, but the scale never transferred in the couple of years we were slowly cutting back the original foliage.

We also are approach grafting new roots on this tree, just to remove a long, boring section of lower trunk. That’s what the blue tape wrappings are about, holding the approach graft in place. That graft is taking well.

I hope this does not send the message ‘Got scale? Graft!’—for that would be a bit extreme. It was just a surprising benefit of what we wanted to do anyway. Spraying oil in May and June is usually a better (and somewhat less complicated) control for scale…

Grafting top and bottom on a Rocky Mountain juniper. All the pest-ridden original foliage has been cut off after several years of letting the scions grow. None of the scale infestation remains and the tree has a completely new vigor and health. Should be a nice bunjin someday.

I also include a couple shotgun shots around my yard in this post—

Engelmann spruce on nylon board.

Closeup of the root mass over the nylon board. I hope the moss will eventually grow over the edge and it will be essentially invisible, floating a bit.

Some of the range of styles and trees I enjoy having around. Traditional, powerful black pine next to the ethereal feeling native vine maple. There's a wisteria to the left bursting with flowers (I took 2/3 of them off, it was nuts this year.) The boxwood to the right you might remember from International Bonsai many years back.

The companion plant bench... just beginning to grow. A couple are flowering already, such as cow pie and the indomitable miner's lettuce. If anyone knows what 'cow pie' really is let me know. From Japan, big leaf, white flower. The majority of these companions are Northwest natives.

This narcissus was blooming three months ago, potted in one of the first bonsai pots I ever made. The drainage holes are 1/4" wide. I had a lot to learn. Last year the flowers were 10" high, this year they were 6"--- plants reduce fast in a pot! Bit too flamboyant to display with a tree but fun on its own.

In the late summer of 2010 I collected this Mountain Hemlock, Tsuga mertensiana, with my friend Anton Nijhuis in Canada, and potted it in a strange box that was sort of cantilevered up because the tree had been prostrate, growing through the mosses on bedrock. Digging through the moss uncovered a rather curious twin-trunk base that seemed like it would have to be styled in an unorthodox way, so naturally I wanted it. A year and a half later the box was full of roots, and the time seemed right to complete this weird idea of mine.

I’ve always wondered about alternatives to stone and prefab slabs. They tend to crack or break just when a show is just being set up; their timing is truly impeccable. Also, a bit ironic given that I used to be a potter, I’ve been drawn to the idea of making nearly invisible platforms, in place of a ceramic container. In other words, something supporting the tree that is really not an element in its presentation. So the idea of an inconspicuous, impervious, strong support had me pondering for a while.

Like many of my creative endeavors, I quiz everyone I know. ‘So, I have this idea… how would you do this if you wanted to do that?’ And you end up with a collage of ideas that you edit and orchestrate into a complete vision, sort of like an orchestra conductor or movie director must do I suppose. With an assortment of weird tools, bolts and ideas the March Seasonal students and I spent more than a day cobbling the thing together, and it was great fun—- Thanks Roger, Gary, John and Konnor!

Mountain Hemlock before styling.

Styled, but before the potting experiment...

Right side view---tree swoops far to the rear before coming forward.

A full box of roots in 100% pumice, one and a half years from collection.

Tree out of the box in position on the nylon board, with a sketch of the platform design in ink. The fragile rootball is held together with cheesecloth. Lots of moving around at this point with an unwrapped rootball would have destroyed it. Gary or Roger's legs, I think... sorry guys, I am not attentive enough to identify your boots or belts. Thanks to both of you, though! There was a fair bit of holding things in position that day.

Konnor Jenson, my intrepid periodic apprentice, filing the edges of the board. Sporting a knit hat, he looks like a diehard Portlander!

The plan to hold the leaning muck wall in place. We did not take a shot of the twine that we wove between the chopsticks, offering a bit more support. The bolt heads you see are the top side of our levitation idea, with round end caps underneath serving as inset 'legs'.

Mossing the surface; disembodied nose courtesy John Kahlie. He passed the mossing test with flying colors and will be relieved to move on to lichen in the next Seasonal... Just kidding, John!

The final design. The small accent plants near the base are heather and a curious evergreen penstemon, for those interested in the smaller elements. The moss may eventually grow over the edge of the platform, hiding it, at least that is the hope. This tree had an odd bend in the right smaller trunk, and I thought the addition of a cantilevered wall on the right side would marry well with that, sort of like a second bad note hit in a jazz piece that you think, 'Huh, that guy must have intended that, so maybe it works.' Opinions? Please let me know. In any event, this tree needs filling out a bit. The buds are swelling well in my greenhouse and it will be in there another month under a misting apparatus. Just like it got naturally on Vancouver Island...

Also, take a look at what Jonas is doing with another hemlock at:

http://bonsaitonight.com/2012/04/03/mountain-hemlock/

Euonymus is a popular genus for bonsai. The burning bush, Euonymus alata, is not a commonly used species, however, and I was excited to give it a whirl. This photo essay was taken in the creation of this bonsai during the Winter Seasonal of 2012, in February.

The Euonymus after growing in an Anderson Flat for a few years. This photo was taken the day of styling, in February 2012.

The stalwart Howard Griesler of Chicago working with the flex-shaft grinder to bring down the large pruning cuts. (Howard is a foodie and loves our eclectic Portland restaurants...)

The redoubtable John Denny from Iowa working on the rootball. (John is a master brewer, and typically makes sage comments about the local micros).

Both gentlemen washing the rootball of some mucky old soil. I stood far away.

The prepared rootball drying a bit before potting.

Pot prepared... for this tree we used a simple mix of 50% akadama/50% pumice. This is not a perfect pot for the tree, but at least it fits. I'm sure there is a colorful glazed pot in its future, perhaps a dark blue or green.

Right about this time Howard's glasses broke. This was our solution---toothpicks from the kitchen deftly wired into place. It is rare to find an opportunity to wire outside of bonsai! One must take them eagerly whenever they arise.

The final result. It needs a stupendous amount of development, but it's an unusual species for bonsai and I'm curious to see where it goes. Certainly it will give the Japanese maples a run for their money in the fall with its vermillion foliage.

I was in Japan for half of February, and will post a few photos from that shortly. Technical problems abound… I used my iPhone for most of the image-making. Unknown at the time, my computer is so old that it will not accept images from the iPhone. And one of the quirks of the iPhone is that you can’t upload images to WordPress. Urg. Eventually I will offer some photos.

This year’s Kokufu was better than the last few years. The Kokufu along with most other bonsai shows in Japan have been in decline for 15 years. The quality of the trees is lower because fewer trees are being entered. In the past only 30% of the trees were accepted; now 70% acceptance is common. Of course the show is still impressive, and worth seeing. A large ‘Shishigashira’ Japanese maple won a Kokufu prize for a client of Shinji Suzuki’s.

After a couple days in Tokyo to see the show and the sales area, I worked in Obuse for Mr. Suzuki wiring trees for about 11 days.

Matt Reel is in his sixth year there, and he will be back in about a year. If he finishes the next year he will be the longest staying American apprentice, finishing up at about 6.7 years. His work has made major strides in the last couple of years, and I’m going to be happy to have him back here in Portland. I need help lifting things… no, kidding, he’s a super fellow and I will enjoy his company and enthusiasm. He will also be looking for client work, so if you want some high caliber work on your trees, let me know and I’ll put you in touch with him.

And there is a newcomer— Tyler Sherrod from North Carolina is finishing his first year at Suzuki’s. He’s also looking at 5+ years. Tyler is a wonderful solid guy and a hard worker. He fits in well there, and it was nice to spend some time with him. I’ll post on his progress in future years—

More later, following some technical overhaul!

The Sakuteiki is a text from the Heian period and is a guide to designing a garden. The taboos are particularly entertaining,  underlined with the warning, ‘To make a garden by studying nature exclusively, without any knowledge of various taboos, is reckless.’ There are problems with building it a certain way that would block the passage of the White Tiger, for example. A bit of texture, perhaps, but not very illuminating for those who grow plants today. More interesting is that they used grasses and flowering perennials more often than is now seen in modern Japanese gardens.

Kyoto stands on the site of the ancient Heian city,  so there are layers of history here that go back a long way. The Heian city was master planned on a grid, like the Chinese Tang capital of AD 700. One of the most arresting images of the book I have, published in 2008 by Jiro Takei and Marc Keane, is of a Heian period residence of a regent family:

Heian period residence, circa AD 1000

The organic relationship between the rectilinear house and the fluid garden is remarkable; it reminded me of a rectangular pot and a flowing tree rising from it. Residences of this type was carefully designed to afford many views of the garden. They were integrated in a sophisticated way that suggests a central relationship with nature. Granted, these were the residences of government officials and not the bunkhouses of Joe Schmo, but still…

Not sure there is any clear link here to what we do with bonsai. One thing is noteworthy, though: Like the eastern United States in the early settlement days, the old woods around the Heian city were demolished to support the growth of the city. There was nothing that was ‘wild nature’ for a great distance. Organically planned gardens re-created the feeling of nature inside the walls of their residences. I wonder if that is not a rare urge for those who live on city grids, and perhaps there is the link to our attraction to bonsai. It’s just remarkable how clearly the Japanese elite expressed that yearning in their lives. There are a lot of examples around the world of gardens designed around homes, but not many where the house is designed around the garden. I’d take my beret off to anyone who designs a house while thinking of a garden.

Cambial activity shuts down first at the top of the tree, then in the trunk, and lastly in the roots. Therefore a tree may well have an active root system well after visible growth or leaf drop has occurred. Also, the upper roots of trees in the ground are the first ones active in the springtime.

Makes you think, doesn’t it? Another complicating piece of the puzzle is that the top of the tree is much more cold hardy than the root zone. The tags we see on nursery containers that read ‘Hardy to_’ assume you will plant it in the ground, where tree roots are designed to be. Those cold ratings are for the top only; roots are more tender. Quite a cautionary tale for those growing bonsai. Roots are calibrated to be in the ground, not in a pot.

There are a couple of important lessons here. While light frosts in the fall will ease a tree into dormancy, unseasonably deep cold in the fall may kill the tree because the roots are still active. Spring is the usual time to be careful of hard frosts, but fall must be watched too. Furthermore, if we live in a mostly mild climate with infrequent arctic blasts we should be aware that bonsai may never go fully dormant, retaining active roots throughout winter.

Healthy roots of most hardy trees and shrubs are fine with light frosts in the upper to mid 20′s (F), which helps to ease them into winter dormancy, but lower than that they need better protection such as placement on the ground or in an unheated room, greenhouse, or coldframe.

Those bonsai spending their winter holidays out on the benches may need a careful weather watcher (that would be you!)

(Reference: Tree Maintenance, P.P. Pirone, 1988)