Shohin_branches Yew gotta give Home Depot plants a chance

[shohin_branches]

Starting a thread for my yew. It was an impulse purchase in the fall of 2021 because I had just bought a new house and was spending a lot of time (and money ) at Home Depot. When a small tree is discounted from $10 to $7 and I'm already buying $80 worth of lumber and paint then it's pretty much free. Bonsai math!

I didn't have any place to put it that first year so I threw it in the vegetable garden for the winter. Then yanked it out in the spring of 2022.



Trimmed and potted it then wired it


For the last two years I wasn't really impressed by this little turd of a tree and I took the wire off too soon. Five days after unwiring all the branches sprung back. I always kinda rolled my eyes at it and reminded myself I need to rewire it. So this spring I figured I'd put it in a more appropriate pot and maybe I'd treat it better.


The roots are doing great. I was surprised how much the yew enjoyed my neglect and disdain.


I threw copper wire on it this time, did a light trim on the roots, shortened up the long nebari, and removed more foliage.


Then slapped it in a pot. I pulled the left branch down further after this photo. Letting the apex grow more then I'll slap some wire on it.
I plan on doing some more carving, bending, and reshaping on the jins this summer and starting a shari.

Not a terrible tree. Maybe I'll even remember to fertilize it this year.

 

[Mats Hagström]

I typically break down bonsai development into different phases. I usually assign what stage H tree is in.

The first face is always trunk development.

During this face, I don’t trim back the tree, but rather encourage large branches to grow that will primarily be sacrificed branches.

Until the trunk is well developed I don’t pay attention to smaller branches except those I may want to keep.

The problem with keeping early branches during trunk development is that they will be disproportionately large as the trunk grows.

In order to maintain the appearance of an old tree we want a large trunk and branches that are substantially smaller in diameter. Young trees have branches with relative large branches and old trees have branches that are relatively smaller. at least having small branches on a larger trunk creates a better illusion of amateur tree.

Once the trunk is properly developed, I begin primary branch development, then secondary and tertiary.

In regards to styling movement in the trunk should be considered at this stage.

It’s fairly important to have some idea of where you’re going with the tree.

Attempting to do later stages at an early time leads to mediocre tree.

If it was my tree, I would first decide what type of Bonsai this is going to be, formal upright semi upright, etc. I would probably then put the tree in the ground if I had access and grow it for several years until I liked the trunk size. If we think of Bonsai trees in decades, rather than years, it can be helpful to understand how we get from here to there.
Here are some examples of what the end goal could look like

The first picture is perhaps what your tree could look like. The third picture is elegant and possibly could be achieved with less time because the trunk is thinner. If you don’t want to grow out trees for many years you will need to spend more money and buy trees that others have grown out for you. The closer a tree is to being finished the more valuable they become.

If you want quality threes then don’t buy cheap trees.

If you are not a member of a local bonsai club than that is a good place to start. Most clubs have annual sales/swaps or auctions which is a better option than Home Depot.

If you want a good understanding of these concepts than consider watching this video a couple of times.

Good luck,

 

[shohin_branches]

@Drcuisine
It's going to be a bunjin

This tread is for documenting the progress on a piece of mediocre shohin stock as I make incremental improvements to it over years. I have a plan in my head I'm just trying to challenge myself to do a better job of documenting the progress.

I have no interest in growing out the trunk. This tree is getting some branch building and I'm working on sticking with the fertilizer routine.