Purple Ghost - Where do I airlayer?

[kimyongtai]

TLDR - where do I airlayer this cutie to maximize probability of success for both "halves" of the tree?

I bought this maple the other day, and it was surprisingly expensive. I justified it in my head by convincing myself that I would make several Purple Ghosts from this one. "It's an investment, honey!"

• First I tried to cut several branches and propagate in a moist soil mix. Epic fail. I believe they all died within 48 hours. I'll keep going for the week, but I'm not holding my breath. Any tips here would be great. Note: I may be answering this question with the second bullet point.
• Second - I'd love a purple ghost bonsai that has a healthy trunk caliper to tree height ratio. I hear 1:6 is a good look here? Seems to hold true on a google image search. My current theory is that the "easiest" method to get here is to airlayer then cut the tree where I marked the photo below.
  
  My concern (maybe obvious to folks) is a) the amount of foliage that the bottom half would be losing, and b) the amount of roots the tree would be losing once transferred into a bonsai pot about 2" deep. Seems like a very stressful transition x 2. Does anybody have success doing something as drastic as this?
• Maybe I'm missing an essential question here:
  Is it better to downsize a 4 foot tree to about 12 inches by..
  a) using a healthy rootstock and the first branch or two OR
  b) using healthy foliage and growing a new rootball by air layering and planting that into the shallow bonsai pot.
  
  Seems to me that option A is risky but maybe a faster route to the 1:6 ratio for trunk:tree height. Option B would be maybe safer but lots of training to get to the healthy trunk ratio.
  
  Thoughts?

I've grown several trees/fruit trees/vegetable gardens successfully. From seed, seedling, pots, etc. Excited to jump in with two feet into the universe of Bonsai. Let's geek out y'all.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Guessing this is a grafted tree.

What you are looking at is a long term process. Likely take a couple years

The tree is a long way from a bonsai pot. It will need to be placed in a larger training pot to grow out. Likely in the same mix for this year to enhance the growth. The present nursery pot is way too small. Perhaps use a 3 gallon nursery pot.

If you are trying to indeed justify the purchase, and as a matter of form, one should immediately air layer off the top 18 or so inches at a junction of a larger and smaller branch. That would get the tree down to 2.5’ minutes the graft

(Or just go whole hog and begin the air layer now close above the graft at a junction of a the trunk and a smaller branch, or just the trunk. But that would be unwieldy, considering the height.)

Anyways this is all speculation until we know your approximate location.

Please click on your icon, the account details and enter this data and your USDA Plant cold Hardiness zone.

Then we can help more.

Cheers
DSD sends

 

[Bowhuntmuledeer]

I’m no expert at all this stuff, but I can tell you what I would do. I’d first do a layer up higher on the tree. Somewhere above the green tape tied to the pole, potentially where the pole kind of disappeared behind the foliage and shadow. I’m not sure what your growing zone is, but for a lot of the US June is good time to do it, seems like! You ought to have enough roots in a couple months to seperate and put it in a growing pot. Don’t try and put it in a bonsai pot just yet. Thats kinda the final phase of the process. I’ve got like a hundred trees and shrubs now, this is basically my third summer messing with em, and only 4 in pots. And I’m not totally sure they even should be In the meantime do a bunch of research on all the aspects of growing this type of tree. By this time next year, you’ll have two of those cool maples, be ready to do another layer, and have a plan for what to do with em!

If you want to get a tree in a pot right away, go get something for $30 at the garden store and play with that while you wait!

Cool tree, best of luck with it!!

 

[Shibui]

• My concern (maybe obvious to folks) is a) the amount of foliage that the bottom half would be losing, and b) the amount of roots the tree would be losing once transferred into a bonsai pot about 2" deep. Seems like a very stressful transition x 2. Does anybody have success doing something as drastic as this?
• Maybe I'm missing an essential question here:
  Is it better to downsize a 4 foot tree to about 12 inches by..
  a) using a healthy rootstock and the first branch or two OR
  b) using healthy foliage and growing a new rootball by air layering and planting that into the shallow bonsai pot.

I do not know Purple Ghost cultivar but most JM have similar requirements so I'll talk in general terms.
Japanese maple are not fussed by massive reduction of the top. Provided you have a healthy branch or 2 the tree will be fine after pruning.
Japanese maple have no problem with root reduction. I routinely remove up to 80% of roots on JM with no adverse reaction.
Usually doing both in one operation. I often take 80% off the top and the roots in one operation. Usually that is OK but occasionally (say 1 in 100) I'll end up with a dead root where the branches it has been feeding have been removed. This occurs more often with older trees than with younger, healthy nursery stock. Staged reduction and/or root reduction will usually reduce that risk. It is very rare for an entire tree to die after pruning or root pruning.

Both option a and b are used extensively and both will work

 

[Hack Yeah!]

@kimyongtai , green leaf maples usually layer easier than red. Some varieties will not layer or may not do so well on their own roots. I'd experiment high enough in the tree to leave a few branches with the rootstock. Good luck