Digging up backyard trees

[symbiotic1]

Hello everyone! I'm new to the site and new to Bonsai so it's good to see an online resource!

I wasn't sure where to classify this question but I guess it's still collecting even if it's my own backyard!

There are two trees (Green Ash from what I was able to tell) that sprung up in a narrow planting bed on the side of my house during a time when the yard was largely neglected. Now they are about 20' tall and need to be removed before they grow any bigger and mess up the masonry around them or hit the eaves of the house. The trunks are a good 5+" in diameter right now.

I thought maybe they might make an interesting bonsai experiment since they have to go anyway and the trunks are nice and thick. I chopped one of them and sealed it to see if it would survive that and some buds have started to appear emerging from the trunk.

My question is how to dig it up safely, the best way to pot it (soil mixture/pot size) for training and how I should manage the buds that do form branches to ensure a good end result! I don't have any experience with digging up trees (that I want to survive at least) but I do have tools and some help to do it.

Any suggestions would be great!

Thanks!
-Aaron

 

[edprocoat]

Hello Aaron, welcome to B-Nut ! There may be someone here who has experience with these green ash trees although I have never heard of one being used for Bonsai. I thought the Green Ash and the Red Ash were eastern U.S. trees but I see you are from Cailfornia. I would think this being a deciduous tree its about to go dormant, not a good time for chopping. Big trees usually need some preparation before collecting and that could be a 2-3 year process.

You could start by making a perimeter cut around the tree out about 12-14 inches with a sharp spade to sever upper roots that spread out, this would allow it to start sending finer roots out while still being connected to the taproot to keep healthy. Thee next year you could tunnel under the center and remove the taproot filling back in the hole with soil and let it recover. The next spring if its particularly strong and healthy tree you could chop it and let it send out good growth working on ramification and that fall when it goes dormant collect it.

If its got to go, chop it and collect it, if it dies you gained some experience and what did it cost you.

ed

 

[Alain]

Hello there,

First welcome.

Then: there is actually a method I read from a Japanese master (Master Ijima) and which is supposed to work with any kind of deciduous (your tree is totally deciduous right?).

It consists of digging the tree at the beginning of Winter, chopping everything of the root ball (just keeping some big roots) and in you case getting ride of the tap roots and then burying it immediately in a hole in the ground for all the Winter.
In Spring you remove the tree from the ground and plant it in a pot.

This method have been use very successfully with Prunus and I will try it myself next November with a lilac from my yard that have to go (btw: yes, even in a yard it's a yamadori )

I have no idea if it will work or not but -as for you - this tree has to go anyway...
In your case you already cut all the branches and the tree, I don't know if it's bad or not.
In the method the branches and trunk has to be severely cut before the burying but they are supposed to have lost their leafs and entered the dormancy following the regular Fall's processes.

Here if the link of a French website of bonsai with guys who tried the method. It's in French but there are a lot of pictures of the different steps (starting at the exhumation of the tree in Spring):
http://artbonsai.alloforum.com/experimentation-methode-iijima-exhumation-t418202-1.html

 

[symbiotic1]

Thank you both for the replies so far!

Yeah when I tried to identify the tree it flagged as being non-native to the west. Not sure how it ended up there but it grew from nothing. We didn't plant it.

To clarify, there are two trees. Each pic is a different tree. One I chopped. The other is still fully intact and about 20' tall. The lowest branch is out of view of the photo, at least 10-15' up the trunk.

That second method sounds quite intensive! I'm not sure I have the room to dig a burial space for the tree but I can see why it would work sort of incubated in the ground like that. I may end up going with the first option and cut a trench around it for one of the trees to dig it up at the end of winter, and just dig up the other one completely, put it in a 10-15 gallon container and see what happens.

Any suggestions on what kind of soil to use in the pot while it (hopefully) recovers and grows out? Just normal potting soil? A growing medium like sphagnum/perlite? Or some other mix of bonsai/other soil? I'm guessing using some of the soil it was growing well in is good too?

Thanks again for your help so far!

 

[Alain]

Wow the 2nd tree has his branches really far from the ground.

Why don't you try an air layering of the trunk much closer to the branches?
Like that when you remove the tree you don't care of its base (which actually looks rather monotonous in bonsai terms on the picture) and start with a tree that must be more interesting (if there are branches there should be some histories).

For the soil: all my trees are in training and I use a mix Brent from Evergreen gardens work describes: 8 parts perlite, 8 parts fine pine bark, 1 part sphagnum moss and you add osmocote fertilizer with an equal NPK (mine is 14/14/14).
I have trees from baby from last Spring to stuff from Home depot or so nurseries and they all seem to like it.

Btw: on Brent's website (evergreengardenwoks.com) there are a lot of articles that could help you decide what you'll do with your trees and help you to take care of them.