I know, right? I feel like I should just slink away from here and join FB to see what everyone had for lunch.
Newbies - want to share your trees?
- Thread starter Clorgan
- Start date
MSU JBoots
Shohin
I was thinking the same thing. No sticks in pots there! Definitely jealous over here.
IzzyG
Shohin
I’m the newbie, the trees not as much
Cajunrider
Imperial Masterpiece
Yep. That cemented my permanent claim as a perennial noob.
RhyleeRebecca
Seedling
I’m fairly new (~1.5 years) and this is my crew: Grey Owl Juniper, Eastern White Cedar, Olive, Hinoki Cypress, and Variegated English Boxwood. All young ( < 10 yrs ) and located in Zone 5, Portland, Maine.I thought it could be fun to make a thread where beginners post their trees...I already have five (four nursery stock, one chinese elm) that I'm hoping will survive to learn on. Nothing I would consider to be good material by most people's standards on here, but I will have fun with them all the same and I'm enjoying learning how to look after them
Us newbies will likely not have the knowledge to advise each other - but at least we can share! Maybe some of the more experienced can chip in with thoughts and point out all the daft mistakes we're making...Someone may spot a problem that we hadn't noticed or knew existed - I'm sure that will be the case for at least one of mine (iffy leaves on hazel?
Maybe if we're all posting pretty sub-par trees together, this will give us the confidence to keep sharing and learning! Would also be cool to see how we progress and improve our skills.
(Sorry if a thread like this already exists - couldn't see one though).
Attachments
Shogun610
Masterpiece
Well then you better figure out how to care for them. Not bad , good starter materialI’m the newbie, the trees not as much
Smivs953
Seedling
Here is what I've acquired over the course of this year, just starting out and have caught the bug 
There are chili plants in amongst this too
There are chili plants in amongst this too
Fidur
Chumono
My cyca palm tree has a beautiful growing pattern.....
Kievnstavick
Shohin
This is my 2nd year actively practicing bonsai and my 4th year learning about it. First time poster on this website. I have a lot of projects in the works. Basically all of my photos are from early May. First year for most of my trees were very basic pruning to remove unwanted growth. The start of this year was a transition to a bonsai soil as well as giving them bigger pots to grow in.
Chamaecyparis thyoides 'Ericoodes'. One of my favorite trees in general. It has compact growth and a wonderful transition of color from a bronzish-purple to the complete green foliage.
This one is an Abies squatamata 'flaky'. Removed about 4 inches of dead squishy wood from the apex as I was worried it would cause issues for the tree. I removed some trouble branches as well as worked on the swollen graft line. Supposedly this is a rare variety/species if it was indeed labeled correctly. I will probably go with an exposed roots look to this tree as it has some interesting roots right at the base. Unfortunately the angle of this picture hides it. Basically two roots form an arching h shape into the substrate.
Garden collected Pseudotsuga menziesii (Douglas Fir). It is 3 years old now. It currently looks a little more sparse for some reason. It is abandoning its old foliage, but the shoots are healthy and growing fine. Still many years to go for this one.
Some maple I can not figure out. This is also another garden collection at 3 years old. Natural slant from improper collection originally (leading to it drooping) as being partially shaded by neighboring plants. Kinda wish I had a current picture as it exploded in growth this year even with the repot. So I feel like I got its timing perfect. The leaves will definitely need to be reduced in the future. Once again, it has many years to just do it's thing.
A Picea pungens 'apache' that I got this year for a 1 year contest. Repotted it and cut the 'leader' off. The top of the tree ended rather abruptly and split into 3 branches. The upward growing one was weaker and didn't look healthy compared to the other two. So I cut it off and wired the better looking branch to take over as the leader. My goal with this one I to try and keep it as one of my smaller trees.
Unknown variety of a crop cherry from my father's house. Collected this year. One of two that he gave me. Trained by weedwacker and lawn mower. It is probably 2 or 3 years old. They are doing quite well despite being pest magnets.
This was taken at the end of April. I really need to get new pictures of all my projects.... anyways all of the plants have since moved outside. I mainly wanted to show y'all my Albizia Saman (or Samanea saman) and my Adonsia Digitata that I am growing. They are 7 months old now. I collected hundreds of the seeds while I was in Hawaii, so I have plenty to expirement with as well as try to obtain wanted characteristics. I have 3 A. Digitata. 2 of them grew mature leaves fairly quickly and the smallest one still has juvenile leaves to this day. I repotted one of them due to root rot taking place in the pot openings. It is currently in a shocked dormancy. Hoping it pulls through. As for the A. Samen... I have probably about 18 or so of them currently. Repotted one cluster (grew 4 in a pot due to space) and they have since recovered after dropping all of their leaves.
Currently in my indoor set-up is 3 Palo Verde trees from Arizona (unknown specific species) out of 10. I let them get too dry while trying to no over water them. I am also attempting to get some Paulownia tomentosa growing for a soil/container growth expirement. I don't plane on turning P. Tomentosa into a bonsai. Just using its growth speed to do the expirement.
I have many more trees, but I don't feel like they are in a show off state as of yet (even for this thread). As you can probably gather, I am very much into growing the trees and unusually ones to boot.
Chamaecyparis thyoides 'Ericoodes'. One of my favorite trees in general. It has compact growth and a wonderful transition of color from a bronzish-purple to the complete green foliage.
This one is an Abies squatamata 'flaky'. Removed about 4 inches of dead squishy wood from the apex as I was worried it would cause issues for the tree. I removed some trouble branches as well as worked on the swollen graft line. Supposedly this is a rare variety/species if it was indeed labeled correctly. I will probably go with an exposed roots look to this tree as it has some interesting roots right at the base. Unfortunately the angle of this picture hides it. Basically two roots form an arching h shape into the substrate.
Garden collected Pseudotsuga menziesii (Douglas Fir). It is 3 years old now. It currently looks a little more sparse for some reason. It is abandoning its old foliage, but the shoots are healthy and growing fine. Still many years to go for this one.
Some maple I can not figure out. This is also another garden collection at 3 years old. Natural slant from improper collection originally (leading to it drooping) as being partially shaded by neighboring plants. Kinda wish I had a current picture as it exploded in growth this year even with the repot. So I feel like I got its timing perfect. The leaves will definitely need to be reduced in the future. Once again, it has many years to just do it's thing.
A Picea pungens 'apache' that I got this year for a 1 year contest. Repotted it and cut the 'leader' off. The top of the tree ended rather abruptly and split into 3 branches. The upward growing one was weaker and didn't look healthy compared to the other two. So I cut it off and wired the better looking branch to take over as the leader. My goal with this one I to try and keep it as one of my smaller trees.
Unknown variety of a crop cherry from my father's house. Collected this year. One of two that he gave me. Trained by weedwacker and lawn mower. It is probably 2 or 3 years old. They are doing quite well despite being pest magnets.
This was taken at the end of April. I really need to get new pictures of all my projects.... anyways all of the plants have since moved outside. I mainly wanted to show y'all my Albizia Saman (or Samanea saman) and my Adonsia Digitata that I am growing. They are 7 months old now. I collected hundreds of the seeds while I was in Hawaii, so I have plenty to expirement with as well as try to obtain wanted characteristics. I have 3 A. Digitata. 2 of them grew mature leaves fairly quickly and the smallest one still has juvenile leaves to this day. I repotted one of them due to root rot taking place in the pot openings. It is currently in a shocked dormancy. Hoping it pulls through. As for the A. Samen... I have probably about 18 or so of them currently. Repotted one cluster (grew 4 in a pot due to space) and they have since recovered after dropping all of their leaves.
Currently in my indoor set-up is 3 Palo Verde trees from Arizona (unknown specific species) out of 10. I let them get too dry while trying to no over water them. I am also attempting to get some Paulownia tomentosa growing for a soil/container growth expirement. I don't plane on turning P. Tomentosa into a bonsai. Just using its growth speed to do the expirement.
I have many more trees, but I don't feel like they are in a show off state as of yet (even for this thread). As you can probably gather, I am very much into growing the trees and unusually ones to boot.
Kievnstavick
Shohin
One more to add...
The two lilacs of unknown variety were collected from a friend's house in early March. This photo is from then. When i was digging it out, i thought it was one tree, but it was actually two trees (or twin trunks) forming one giant tap root. I was unable to preserve their original look during extraction. Currently in grow boxes at my dad's house. The closest one to the frame flowered and grew out leaves. It seems to have suffered with the damage quite nicely. The furthest one tried to flower and leaf out but they all dried out. The layer under the bark is still green to this day but it will be a waiting game to see if it lives through the winter. I don't recall if I saw buds on it or not.
The two lilacs of unknown variety were collected from a friend's house in early March. This photo is from then. When i was digging it out, i thought it was one tree, but it was actually two trees (or twin trunks) forming one giant tap root. I was unable to preserve their original look during extraction. Currently in grow boxes at my dad's house. The closest one to the frame flowered and grew out leaves. It seems to have suffered with the damage quite nicely. The furthest one tried to flower and leaf out but they all dried out. The layer under the bark is still green to this day but it will be a waiting game to see if it lives through the winter. I don't recall if I saw buds on it or not.
MacSpook
Yamadori
These azaleas were in 2 pots that were bought cheaply from a local store 4 years ago and put out in a bed in the garden. They never really flourished or flowered well. I later found out that the soil was totally wrong for them. As my interest in bonsai was growing, last winter I decided to dig them up to see if I could do anything with them. This is when I realized that each pot actually had 3 plants in each. I have no idea of which variety they are but I thought they would be good for practicing wiring and styling. I lost one of them during the transplanting so here are the 5 survivors.
It's also a good opportunity to try my camera instead of crappy phone pics.
Cascade
Upright
Windswept
Not decided on the next 2, just letting them grow
Mac
It's also a good opportunity to try my camera instead of crappy phone pics.
Cascade
Upright
Windswept
Not decided on the next 2, just letting them grow
Mac
Lumaca
Mame
I've been catching up with real life and had very limited time to work on trees (lost a couple favourites due to heatwave in the process...) but this guy has been doing well:
Pinus Merkusii finally getting the girth I wanted after 2 years from a whip. Wondering if I should reduce pot size or cut the top off first...
In other news, wires have been biting hard...
Pinus Merkusii finally getting the girth I wanted after 2 years from a whip. Wondering if I should reduce pot size or cut the top off first...
In other news, wires have been biting hard...
I also have Sumatran pines.
It's hard to find any references for the species. Just wondering how's the current progress with your Sumatran pine? How you got the girth? Mine still pretty basic
Lumaca
Mame
Hmmm mainly coco peat, water and sun. Then just let it grow while and cut branches every end of year to promote lower growth. The tree is very elastic so wires have to stay longer than you think otherwise it will bounce back to original shape.
Here it is 2 and 1 year ago, when I mistakenly used STEEL wires which was HARD.
Fi5ch
Mame
I'll bite; here are some of my better attempts since I started in the spring of 2020. A BC forest, mugho, collected boxwood, 2 scots pines, DAS, and a 4 year JBP in a grow box. Except for the boxwood, all were started as seedlings purchased for $2.00-$3.00.
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heeclee
Sapling
My little elm tree refuses to change the color Put on decent amounts of branches and the lower branches were grown out to hopefully add some girth to the lower trunk.
Put on decent amounts of branches and the lower branches were grown out to hopefully add some girth to the lower trunk.
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
Hey, I remember this thread!
Always makes me happy when it pops back up.
Always makes me happy when it pops back up.
Scorpius
Chumono
Mine held their leaves well into November.My little elm tree refuses to change the color
View attachment 460641
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
Elms, as I've seen them anyway, tend to be among the last to turn. The big Siberian elms around here haven't turned yet, and it's been a week of freezing temperatures at night. The one I have in a pot is just starting to change, and my Chinese elm has changed but not dropped any leaves yet.
Kingpoutine
Sapling
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