Giga
Masterpiece
big hornbeam and beech are heavy! come prepared as it sucks to carry a heavy tree
Best trees to collect in Georgia
- Thread starter tylerwdesign
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- atlanta collecting georgia yamadori
Melospiza
Shohin
If anyone wants a Peach, I have a nice one I collected last year but planted in the ground since I read that they are hard to bonsai. I am in midtown Atlanta. Let me know.
substratum
Shohin
Do you have wild plum trees in GA? I'm not sure if they are indigenous plants or not, but they grow wild in agricultural north FL, so I would presume they grow wild in (even more agricultural) GA. They are hardy. When I lived in the country, I had hundreds of these things on my property, and there were parts of the property that I mowed at the beginning of the growing season, and they'd always grow back a foot or two by the end of the growing season. They have a lovely white flower (blooming now), will produce Quarter-sized plums, and have interesting bark. We also have wild persimmon trees (or maybe naturalized is a better word) in parts of north FL.
Many of the land owners that hunt like having these plums and persimmon trees on the property for deer and turkey forage.
Many of the land owners that hunt like having these plums and persimmon trees on the property for deer and turkey forage.
GGB
Masterpiece
Loblolly, sand and virginia pine! lucky
GGB
Masterpiece
Oh and short leaf! echinata
GGB
Masterpiece
also pitch pine!!
tylerwdesign
Sapling
Not sure if we have plum or persimmon. Definitely something I will look into and keep an eye out for.
tylerwdesign
Sapling
There are definitely a ton of loblolly where I will be hunting, not sure about the rest but I will keep an eye out. I was under the impression loblolly didn't lend itself well to bonsai. Possibly for a Literati, but the needle length stays long? I had been thinking of trying one anyways. Growing up surrounded by them I feel it would be a shame not to try.
GGB
Masterpiece
@tylerwdesign I'm just a dumb yankee and you might be right about loblolly. I have a few but i haven't tried to reduce needle length, others here have advised me that they'll shrink some. And to be honest I find pitch pine wicked annoying to deal with but some here like it. I have never tried short leaf but I imagine they're like pitch, ugh. But I've heard sand pine (p. clausa?) shows some promise as okay american material. And virginia pine is pretty cool.
Gary Wood works with loblolly, maybe he occupies some corner of the internet, it's hard to find advie on them. And zach smith sells them at bonsai south, he's not a huge pine guy but he knows more than I do
Gary Wood works with loblolly, maybe he occupies some corner of the internet, it's hard to find advie on them. And zach smith sells them at bonsai south, he's not a huge pine guy but he knows more than I do
GGB
Masterpiece
Melospiza
Shohin
Chickasaw Plums grow widely in Georgia. You see them blooming in spring along roadsides, but I have never been able to get one for myself. American persimmons are also widespread and older trees have wonderful alligator-like bark.
GrimLore
Bonsai Nut alumnus... we miss you
I am ordering a few small ones from TYTY in Alabama and growing them out in the Landscape to control the initial shape as they grow. My target delivery date here is mid-April which is the best time to plant or pot them up in this area.
As to the borers people mentioned with Pear trees - Those also destroy a lot of other Fruit trees. Having had an Orchard at the last place, and several different Fruit Trees potted here I can tell you I have never had any borer problem. I believe it is related to location and climate...
Grimmy
Melospiza
Shohin
But honestly, if you have land that has at least some area that has not been clear-cut or invaded by privet and honeysuckle, you are sure to find hawthorns growing there- Mayhaw, Littlehip and Parsley-leaf hawthorns are among the more common ones. They have beautiful fluted trunks with bark that sheds in patches revealing orange underneath. Going to the swamps in summer to collect baskets of Mayhaw to turn into jellies used to be a big cultural aspect of life in the Southeast that is now lost. 
GGB
Masterpiece
@Melospiza shame to hear that. I think the southeast (N./S. carolina and Georgia) have the best vegetation in the whole USA. Beats California in my opinion. You guys are lucky to have such beautiful natives
Melospiza
Shohin
I have only lived here for 9 years or so (from India) and I have grown to love the trees here so much. Alabama and western Georgia have the highest density of tree species in North America (http://biodiversitymapping.org/wordpress/index.php/usa-trees/). That said, every part of the world has its own beautiful and unique tree species, whether it is the paper birch of northen US states, or the immense tamarind and fig trees in southern India.
substratum
Shohin
Just did an image search, and believe it's the same plum tree. Thanks for putting a name to it. I've got a persimmon in my front yard that probably is 40 years old, and the bark does have a lot of character. The squirrels get all the persimmons, though.
tylerwdesign
Sapling
Thought I would update this with a few of the trees I found. Some of them I am unsure of the species, so any help on IDs would be appreciated. This is really just a small portion of what I found. Left my phone in the car when I went out hunting, and snapped a few pics of some of the trees closer by before leaving. Tons of Eastern Red Cedar (Juniper - Juniperus virginiana ), loblolly pine, and winged elm. also a bunch of these really short shrubs with pretty small compact foliage that I thought could be pretty cool to collect (No clue what they are. I was surprised to find several of the smaller juniper had adult foliage, or at least close to it. Generally anything Ive seen small enough to collect has the very young spiky leaves. One has a really cool bend, but may be a little to large to be useful as bonsai, Im not sure yet. The other was very bushy and dense. I also found several loblolly pine with great taper. Not something Ive seen to often in smaller trees since they grow so fast and straight up. I will hopefully be going back in the next weekend or 2 to collect a few. Im afraid Im already pushing it collecting them a little late.
tylerwdesign
Sapling
Melospiza
Shohin
I dug up a smaller Loblolly pine late last summer in GA, and it did fine, so hopefully yours are too. The small leafy shrub is a Callery pear, sometimes called Bradford pear. A horrible weed in GA, so it's good that you are planning to remove it from the landscape. The bare shrub after that is likely a Winged Elm, one of my favorite GA trees. Could the final tree be a Hawthorn, like Mayhaw?
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