Seedy Adventure: The Germination Begins (A Stick to Pot side story)

[Kievnstavick]

Outside of the outrageously length title (I just wanted a fun title!), welcome to the begining of the thread.

I plan to document my process, trials, and errors in this thread directly pertaining to the pursuit of growing pre-bonsai from seed as my own record as well as having a public place for others to hopefully learn from my process.

One of the biggest mysteries for me when I started growing trees from seed was how do I go from a little seedling to an amazing looking bonsai 10, 20, or 30 years in the future. There was plenty of information and guides on how to create a bonsai from nursery stock (which were already 5ish year old sticks), but a question lingered for me on what to do before then with a future bonsai in mind.

A lot of the information I found revolving around this niche part of an already niche hobby was easily summed up as "just let it grow into a tree, then work on it."

I felt that that was surely something more we could do to up to that point in order to set up a future tree to not look like a tree we gave a severe trunk chop to then grew into a bonsai.

A handful of YouTube videos I had come across gave some information, but they never really satisfied my question. They tended to give overly vague generalities that never really stuck with me despite watching them multiple times.

I was inspired by a Bonsai Wire podcast that featured Micheal Hagedorn and John Eads talking about the topic of growing trees from seed. The message that struck me was "We need more growers of quality stock." That Spring, I planted quite a bit of seeds from various species (to be posted later on) to start the growing process. I figured I would try to figure what I could on this subject while keeping my eye out for any opportunities to learn about the growing aspect of bonsai.

In hindsight, one of the things I didn't do optimally was keep my saplings in constrained environments for too long. I'll get to talking about that at a later time. My initial thought process behind it, was roots were hard to correct later down the road. So I needed to get to roots set up for success early on to create a nice radial nebari. My intent was good, but my execution could have been better.

Sometime late last year, I was once again inspired by Little Things for Bonsai People podcast speaking on a topic of learning from professionals in person. I finally decided to make the jump and joined a class being taught by John Eads on growing bonsai from seed. I can't stress enough how much doing hands on work with someone to help teach you things has helped me.

 

[Kievnstavick]

The start next year off big, I sowed a plethora of different species. I didn't count them this year as there was...well a lot. Once I get my operation down, then I'll know how much I can realistically sown and move on through the next few years.

The seeds I sowed this week are as follows:
Acer (various collected seeds)
Japanese Flowering Cherry (A whole 1020 tray to just these)
Japanese Flowering Cherry (Yoshino Hybrid)
Katsura Tree
Korean Fir
Korean Hornbeam
Pacific Madrone (Trialing and playing genetic lotto for tolerant stock).
Western Larch
Zelkova



I gave all of the cold stratification requiring seeds a 24 hour soak (more like 20 hours, but who is counting) in humic, fulvic, and kelp solution that I used for foliar spraying as my last trial with that soak seemed to do better then just water. No scientific tests on germination rate vs regular water so take that with a grain of salt.

This year I planted them in 60/40 small pumice and coco-coir. The "regular" bonsai size grains seems way too big for seeding. I'll reserve that size for once the plants need to be potted.

Instead of my usual nice rows of seeds with equal amounts per spot, I more or less dumped them in their respective areas and did a general spread. I'll see how this turns out vs the much more time consuming organized method. The basic idea is that I'll be bare rooting and poting them up in early on anyways. So the density of planting shouldn't matter in the short term. I settled on this after speaking with John Eads about initial planting density to see how it works out for me. As someone with a perfectionist streak, It certainly bothered the hell out of me, but sometimes you can't let your inner demons rule your life like that xD.

 

[Kievnstavick]

The following photos are of the seeds that I planted for growing through last year. The photos were taken today as I was running out the door to head to work. Not the best photos, but I didnt have any more recent photos of them.

These are all one year old and should be getting their own growing pots next spring. I let these seedlings do their thing in the first year without any work, but fertilized occasionally during the summer. I am hoping to improve my fertilizer frequency next year.

Tray 1 contains Korean Fir, dwarf flowering quince, and a species of serviceberry (alnifolia). Looking at these photos I took today, I should give this tray some fertilizer as the Firs seem a tad yellow. I don't entirely remember my seeding mix in this tray, but it looks like I have perlite in it with a spaghum moss top coat.



Tray 2 contains Korean Hornbeam seeds in it that didn't germinate the year prior. I am giving it this last spring before I reuse this tray. What is currently growing it is is self sown plants.



Tray 3 houses my only bald cypress to germinate. I was certainly expecting a whole lot more to crop up, but I'll take what I can get. I'll see what comes up this spring before reusing the tray.



Tray 4 contains a single Sitka Spruce and a couple of Dawn Redwoods. I also germinated some tropicals in here last winter that have since been put into their own grow pots.



Tray 5 contains Katsura Trees and Zelkova trees. These were sown quite densely as I did not expect the high germination rate that I received. The ones that made it through the great crowdingwill finely get their own space next spring. In hindsight, I should have either planted the seeds less densely or separated the seedlings early on. I also need to get in their and clean the leaf debris...

 

[Kievnstavick]

Pictured below are my my 1 year old Oregon Oaks native to my locale. I planted them indoors and carried them through the winter under grow lights. This winter is their first dormancy period. Three of them were thick enough to wire and put some movement in them.

These are ones that I left in too small of a container for too long. My intent on leaving them in the containers was to allow the root pruning pots to do their work and let the root system become denser before performing root work. I won't see the results of this effort until next year, but the amount of growth on these oaks was less then I was expecting for their first full year. Some of the oaks had escape roots digging into the ground that I severed in my move to a new place.

In hindsight, it would probably have been for the best to bare root them and root prune (or use the washer meathod) to set the root base up for success in early to mid-spring.



Pictured below is a group of five red Chojubui that I bought from John Eads during my last class as I wanted to increase the number I had to play with the species. They might be ready for some wire next year.



This tray has five Sekka Hinoki that I wanted to play with after seeing Eric Schrader's video on them. I bought these from John Eads. Too thin to put movement in them, but maybe next year. The tray also has 10 Sargent's Crabapples which I wired for movement during John's latest class. They will be getting a bigger pot to grow in next year.



Sorry for the out of focus stick. My quick review of the photo didn't catch it.

These two tall saplings are Japanese Flowering Cherries (P. serrulata). This species is one of my must have trees not only in my garden, but also for a bonsai collection. These two are two years old now. After growing in a tray for a year, I gave them a bigger pot to grow in with vermiculite, pumice, and charcoal substrate. This fall I gave them movement with wiring. I am aiming for slightly larger sized trees with these.



Captured here are the seven two-year old Korean Hornbeams and six two-year old Vine Maples. They all grew in the same seed tray in the first year. At the beginning of their second year, I barerooted them, trimmed the roots up, and put them in their new homes. I filled up an anderson flat with some vermiculite and pumice fines to act as a sort of pot over pot or mametray. Just a another area to grow into and make sure the trees didnt dry out over the summer. After my spring class with John Eads, I gave the hornbeams a supporting wire and gave them a little twist for movement. The Vine Maples were just left to do their weird ground crawl.

The wire was removed sometime during the summer with a couple being just a little too late in removal. During the late fall class with John, I discovered a handful of the trees had almost as much root mass in the flat as they probably have in their small pots. You can clearly see in the Korean Hornbeams which ones were the escape artists as they are much larger. I had thought the container size was "good enough" for now, but I was mistaken in how quickly these grew.

During the fall, I also gave the more vigorous saplings a pruning to create early divisions and to set up growth for next year.

The lesson I learn with this trial was to either give them a bigger grow container or to perform an up pot during the summer. My intention with this growing set up was to use the small containers to concentrate the roots in that small area while allowing roots to escape. Then lift the pots up at a set time to prune the escape roots to hopefully fill up the pot with usable roots.

 

[Kievnstavick]

Pictured below is a five year old Lodgepole pine that I obtained from a coworker. They grew it from seed, but kept it in a bonsai training pot for the first two years. Under my care, I left it for a year and then gave it a repot into better substrate. In the spring this year, I gave it another repot into a bigger container realizing my logical error for keeping it in the training pot. After fall growers class, I gave the sapling some more movement. It was initially just growing to the side.



Pictured here is a Sargent's Crabapple that I repotted this spring. I believe I bought this from John Eads at the previous year's fall sale put on by a locale club. This fall I put movement into this year's extensions. I'm still trying to figure out the direction to proceed with this sapling, but I continued with the curvy movement.



These four are Stryrax (I could have swore I have five but I couldn't locate the last one.) I bought these from John during the fall class. They were extracted from grow plugs and half the root ball was removed. They were planted with a washer and given some movement.



Last tree on this post is a Red Alder that self seeded in one of my pots. I forget the exact age, but i believe this is three years old from seed. This year, I gave it a pruning changing the apex in to a sacrificial leader to build more point of taper. The lower portion of the trunk is too thick to wire for movement. I am restricted to either chopping it on the straight section or making use of the current look. I'll give it a good thinking through during the next bud-break and figure out how I want to tree to progress.

My initial thought on this tree was to follow through with the grow and chop method. After my first class with John, I re-thought my approach and decided "just letting it grow" wasn't fun or engaging to me. The lesson with this tree was to wire early for movement, other wise you will get straight boring sections and potentially poor future branch placements.



The bigger overall lesson in these is find out what appeals to you and keeps you engaged with the hobby. Do what makes you happy.