My neglected Trident: Hopeless or Hopeful?

[bonsaiwood]

Seeing all the recent discussions on challenging Tridents in the forum pages lately has me reaching for a malformed tree in my garden. I picked this up at Lone Pine Nursery in the summer of 2017, just weeks before the North Bay fires broke out. They were having a sale around this time. On my visit I came across an older, broom-style Trident Maple parked on a bench along with other odd-ball trees they were trying to unload. I spoke to a sales lady, and she informed me the tree was routinely hedged back for some time, without much in the way of proper styling/pruning/root work. It was obvious to me the tree was neglected for years and had only received minimal care. Given its structural flaws she provided a nice discount, so I took it home.

Since then, I have not done much more than remove some larger dead branches and re-potted the tree into its original pot in 2019 (I’ll take a picture of the stamp to post soon).

Now on to the bad …





Trunk: Lower half is smooth and rather straight with a large hollow at the base. The upper half is gnarled and scarred. When I look at the tree, it reminds me of a boxer in the 12th round, beaten to a pulp and tired.

Nebari: Terrible … Some larger roots that flare out, then sharply bend downward with ugly knobs at the bends (maybe it was underpotted for years?) ... in any case the tree could use a whole new set of roots.



Branching: No clear direction, some were perhaps threaded but never properly trained. Most, if not all, need to be removed sooner than later.

Taper: Reversed, as seen in the side view pictures above.

One more for "good measure".



Could it have been a nicer looking tree at some point in its life? Probably wishful thinking on my part. In any regard, I would like to think there's a good reason I have kept it alive.

Is there any hope to make something out of this ugly piece of material?

I would love to transform this tree into a sumo shohin Trident, however I feel the need to keep it alive after any major trunk or root reduction outweighs the imagination, for the moment. Sure, it will need a major chop at some point ... so should I ... plant the tree in the ground (or grow box) and bury the ugly roots now to setup a layering and eventual chop later? It seems to me that chopping now would be risky without fresh buds on the lower half of the trunk.

Thread is open to any suggestions. If time would be better spent on something else, please say so. I just hate the idea of wasting a tree .... At worst, I'll plant it in the ground tomorrow with the roots buried and plan for next year.

 

[Eckhoffw]

Man,… that is something.
Air layer?see what happens?

 

[bonsaiwood]

Thanks for chiming in.
Air layering at those marks is one possibility I am still considering ... adding in a couple of pictures of the tree in leaf last summer.

 

[bonsaiwood]

Closer look at the roots and the pot stamping (pictures taken today).

 

[19Mateo83]

I’m mind goes to fixing the nebari by letting it grow unchecked and juice it with fertilizer. Then very carefully strip the bark in between and around those roots and taking advantage of the top growth to power the new root development. Then IF you are successful, air layer just under that chunky top and use those new roots below to power the air layer roots up top. Then you “should” have two half way decent trees from one ugly duckling.

 

[bonsaiwood]

Thanks for those great suggestions, Mateo.

Love the idea of splitting off the top from the bottom, if the steps are done correctly and I succeed that is. Certainly going to be a multi-year project with the first two expected to be the most challenging. But I'm up for it!

 

[Shibui]

I really doubt this tree has ever looked great. My estimation is that it has had problems at each stage of development. The top is typical of many of the 'grow a thick trunk then make a huge chop' trees.
The roots are typical of 'don't cut roots too hard' school of trident development.

My thoughts run along the lines of @19Mateo83 to look for 2 trees from this but I've never had much success with developing new roots among stronger, large roots so I'd go full ground layer just above the existing roots to take advantage of the basal flare but to get a full circle of same age roots on the base.
Getting shoots to pop on an old trunk like this is never guaranteed but worth a try. You can always approach graft a new leader if it doesn't sprout. Pretty sure it was @SeanS in South Africa that posted a progress report on one he did that with a few years ago.

 

[SeanS]

Getting shoots to pop on an old trunk like this is never guaranteed but worth a try. You can always approach graft a new leader if it doesn't sprout. Pretty sure it was @SeanS in South Africa that posted a progress report on one he did that with a few years ago.

Here it is. A large trident that I chopped down to a few inches with no visible buds during summer. The following spring I had to approach graft seedlings to the stump. It’s grown tremendously but has never popped a bud on the original stump, the seedling grafts are all that have kept it alive and kicking!

Chop with caution…

 

[leatherback]

If it were my tree...

I would do rootwork this spring, and plant deep so that the nebari is fully covered, including the first inch or so of the trunk. Really hide that swell in substrate.

Let it grow strong over the year, then trim back. I personally am not too worries it would not back-bud, but to be safe one could leave the lowest branch in place. By next spring, check what the roots at the base have done and decide whether you can work the roots really hard or not. That year just let a sacrifice leader grow out, and do this again in 2026. In 2026 fall you should have this back onto a track for development.

Instead one could airlayer,but I am not sure the top is worth the trouble (Except for experience and getting another tree). If you airlayer, I would be wary of falling in the trap of airlayering the full top. Then only layer the part with good taper?

 

[gooeytek]

I like it a lot as it is. Although it goes against many checkboxes (reverse taper, less than optimal root flare) of what everyone looks for in a bonsai, I think it's got a lot of character.
If it were my tree, I would treat the roots as @leatherback suggested and bring up the level of substrate and even adjust the topography to cover the downward-growing spots and leave the thicker flares exposed.
I would let it leaf out and train the entire canopy down, no air layers.

 

[Gabler]

If it were my tree, I would:

1. Cut back hard on the roots and plant it deep in a root pouch to fix the nebari.
2. Wait until a full year has passed after it has become vigorous again.
3. Chop the trunk at no more than a 45° angle from horizontal, just above the first branch. Based on the photos, you should be able to completely remove the bulging section of the tree, but keep a live branch near the chop location to keep the sap flowing and mitigate the risk of dieback.
4. Let it grow, and reevaluate after another year has passed, once you know where you'll have branches to work with.

Take that with a grain of salt. I mostly keep deciduous trees, and I have several species of maple, but no trident maples specifically.

 

[bonsaiwood]

I'd go full ground layer just above the existing roots to take advantage of the basal flare but to get a full circle of same age roots on the base.

I agree, this right here will need to happen before any large chops are made. In other words, ‘build from the ground up’.

 

[bonsaiwood]

Here it is. A large trident that I chopped down to a few inches with no visible buds during summer. The following spring I had to approach graft seedlings to the stump. It’s grown tremendously but has never popped a bud on the original stump, the seedling grafts are all that have kept it alive and kicking!

Chop with caution…

Thanks @SeanS
I like the idea of approach grafting after a chop to give the tree a head start in terms of top growth. I’ll be tuning in to your thread. Great to see how well your tree has responded considering the amount of work done.

 

[Gabler]

I agree, this right here will need to happen before any large chops are made. In other words, ‘build from the ground up’.

I would trust what @Shibui says, but I do wonder why we think the existing nebari is beyond hope. Can you not build ramification from the surface roots in the existing base of the tree? It looks to me like the tree just needs a hard root pruning and a deeper training pot, and I'm wondering why my ideas on fixing the tree are so different.

 

[bonsaiwood]

If it were my tree...

I would do rootwork this spring, and plant deep so that the nebari is fully covered, including the first inch or so of the trunk. Really hide that swell in substrate.

Thanks for your feedback @leatherback.
In your opinion, would it be more effective to peel back a layer of bark around the entire trunk to the cambium (as we would an air layer, for instance) just below where we want the new roots to grow?

 

[bonsaiwood]

I like it a lot as it is. Although it goes against many checkboxes (reverse taper, less than optimal root flare) of what everyone looks for in a bonsai, I think it's got a lot of character.

Character is there for sure and I enjoyed simply clipping it and doing the essential horticultural work, to the point the flaws did not seem to bother me. But after several years of neglect, the flaws appear more noticeable. At the very least, it will be the subject of experiments.

 

[leatherback]

would it be more effective to peel back a layer of bark around the entire trunk to the cambium (as we would an air layer, for instance) just below where we want the new roots to grow?

I am not sure. I find trident throws roots from the trunk as long as kept moist.

 

[bonsaiwood]

I would be wary of falling in the trap of airlayering the full top. Then only layer the part with good taper?

I am not sure. I find trident throws roots from the trunk as long as kept moist.

Great point about keeping the top intact for a season or two while the new roots push to sustain the canopy above. Ground layer > Air layer, this year.

 

[bonsaiwood]

If it were my tree, I would:

1. Cut back hard on the roots and plant it deep in a root pouch to fix the nebari.
2. Wait until a full year has passed after it has become vigorous again.
3. Chop the trunk at no more than a 45° angle from horizontal, just above the first branch. Based on the photos, you should be able to completely remove the bulging section of the tree, but keep a live branch near the chop location to keep the sap flowing and mitigate the risk of dieback.

Great suggestions here. I favor the idea of planting the tree in a root pouch over a plastic nursery container for this purpose. I think the lower-most branch will be kept as the sacrificial at the time of chop. After a couple of seasons I should have some fresh roots to play with and short trunk to graft unto.

 

[Shibui]

In your opinion, would it be more effective to peel back a layer of bark around the entire trunk to the cambium (as we would an air layer, for instance) just below where we want the new roots to grow?

I am not sure. I find trident throws roots from the trunk as long as kept moist.

Both will work. For a few years I did not worry about good radial roots on tridents. Just planted the existing roots deep in the grow beds. In 2-3 years most had developed a complete new set of roots just under soil level. Many of those root systems were great, more were perfectly acceptable. For larger numbers of trees it saved a lot of initial root work but not all trunks developed roots as expected so a proportion of trees needed subsequent root remediation or to be scrapped altogether.
Peeling the bark - as for layering - produces roots exactly where you want them. You can choose the trunk angle by making the cut at an angle if desired. Roots start in a few weeks rather than months or years so results are quicker.
Layering will often produce good roots right round the trunk but that's never guaranteed. There's always the chance of a less than ideal result whenever we work with living things and neither of these techniques are exempt from that..