This may well qualify as the most useless post I offer this year… because it will have relevance only every decade or so. Seventeen years, in some cases… I’m talking about cicadas. Recently I was in the Midwest and saw this cicada damage on a client’s beech. The cicada will lay eggs in the branches [...]
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Cicada Damage On Bonsai
Posted in Uncategorized on November 16, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Red Maple in Fall Color
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Anne Spencer, deciduous bonsai, Maple bonsai, red maple, red maple bonsai on October 18, 2011 | 14 Comments »
This post is dedicated to Portland’s own dear lady of deciduous, Anne Spencer, who passed recently. Anne grew this Red maple, Acer rubrum, from a three year old seedling twenty years ago. It is one of the joys of my backyard. This maple is a fine example of what slow dedicated work can bring, which [...]
Extreme Tidiness!
Posted in Uncategorized on October 14, 2011 | 7 Comments »
You think bonsai artists take things a bit far sometimes? This artist’s compulsive clean-up acts made me laugh out loud… His name is Ursus Wehrli.
Sight of the Blind Mind: Part II
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Bonsai, bonsai aesthetics, Bonsai Art, Crataegus Bonsai on September 17, 2011 | 16 Comments »
When I was in graduate school learning ceramics, a friend of mine asked our sculpture teacher when he was demonstrating assembling a work with clay slabs, sticks, and coils, ‘When you’re making those decisions, what are you thinking?’ The teacher paused and replied simply, ‘I’m not thinking at all.’ And he looked at us and [...]
Floating White Egret Flowers
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Accent plant, bonsai accent, bonsai companion, Habenaria radiata, orchid, Pecteilis radiata, White Egret Flower on September 12, 2011 | 13 Comments »
This orchid, Habenaria radiata, (syn. Pecteilis radiata) is from Asia and is one of the most delicate and lovely of the terrestrial orchids commonly used as an accent for bonsai. It grows from a bulb that over-winters without leaves. A couple years ago I put two bulbs in this pot and they’ve trebled in number, sending up [...]
The Hook To Hang Our Hat On: Part I
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged about bonsai, Bonsai, Bonsai philosophy on August 13, 2011 | 12 Comments »
If you like wearing hats, like me, you’ll know that just about anything can be a hat support. Anything, really: A chair, a hook, a doorknob. A rack in the oven. Hats, if you’re a hat person, are everything. You live for hats. You don’t live for the hook. Oddly enough, we can get everything [...]
Adjusting and Maintaining a Large Cryptomeria–
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bonsai refinement, cryptomeria bonsai on July 18, 2011 | 4 Comments »
This cryptomeria was one of the standout trees in Boon’s backyard when I studied with him ten years ago. He’s been maintaining it for years. It was originally styled by Mitsuya during one of his visits to the states in the early ’90′s, and is the most significant cryptomeria I’ve seen in the United States. [...]
Documentary Film of Bonsai Apprenticeship—
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Apprenticeship, Bonsai, bonsai apprenticeship, bonsai study, Japanese traditional arts, Obuse Japan, Shinji Suzuki on June 16, 2011 | 5 Comments »
In early 2004, when my apprenticeship with Shinji Suzuki was only four months gone, a TV crew came to make a documentary on apprenticing in bonsai. They focused on the gaijin, me, and after a couple days of filming came up with this eight minute piece that ran on a local channel. Afterwards, quite a [...]
New Flowering Companion Plants…
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Bonsai, bonsai accent, bonsai companion, columbine, false solomon's seal, flowering accent, penstemon, saxifrage on May 30, 2011 | 3 Comments »
The words ‘companion’ and ‘accent’ are used interchangeably to indicate a plant or object used in bonsai display. Last year I made a post of several in my backyard… http://crataegus.com/2010/05/13/accents/ …and here are a few more. I have been heavily focused on Northwest native perennials since moving to Portland, Oregon. Part of the reason is [...]
Youtube Styling of a Large Juniper
Posted in Before and after, Uncategorized, tagged bonsai video, bonsai wiring, florida bonsai, juniper bonsai, Juniper styling, juniper wiring, miami tropical on May 23, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Although it was a few years back (2007), I just uploaded this video to Youtube. In a post long ago I shared before and after photos of a juniper I wired at Miami Tropical, and here’s the video of it… hope you like Stan Getz. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSh_g-njlwU
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