So just chopped&potted my 1st *large* Podocarpus yamadori (many pics in-thread!), hoping for any advice on aftercare!!

[SU2]

I was driving-home when I spotted it, these are VERY hard to find I've been seeking one for half a decade now w/o luck, seems it was ~an hour of being curbside the rootball's edge was dry but interior still had some moisture, was a good size:



I chopped the top&bottom, leaving some "extra/sacrificial height" on the shoots for possible die-back:


and potted-up in my usual mix, very free-draining but rich:
(I used a mix of "orchid mix" type mixture ~70%, and 30% perlite, to bring it to the top / to surround the rootball, then top-dressed with "fortified mulching" and some very rich humus from an old&active raised bed of mine, can smell the myco from feet away lol)

I'm worried of the scale-insects (or soot-mold?) that I'm seeing as black/darkened spots all over the foliage... I do like the 2 main trunks (I suspect it was originally a 5 specimen 'bundle' that fused, there's 2 'main' thickest trunks and a 3rd that I suspect I may keep, then a few thinner ones in the back that'll be removed I just figured it'd help to refrain for now, less trauma / wounding yknow!)

^3rd "real trunk" is peering-out between the 2 main trunks, here's a couple shots that really show those "other trunks" in the rear:



I didn't use IBA, and I did seal the wounds (after 24hrs) with a quick-dry caulking (my go-to for wound dressings)
^You can see how those tiny rear limbs are hardly visible, they all got some caulking too, figure I'll remove them if/once it's in active growth!


Any advice/tips would be greatly appreciated, realllllly wanna keep this guy, I have success (usually) collecting small seedling / whip sized Podo's but think I have 1 larger Podo collection under my belt (failed, and was way closer to when I started than to now, all I do is collect heck I finally have my Live Oak and a Loropetalum that've made it past root-prunings, want any & all advantages with this Podo, am:

1 - keeping him in a spot where he just gets a lil filtered afternoon light, then indirect-only from 12.30p onwards
2 - low-wind location, and am misting the crown when I water the garden (2-4x/day avg)
3 - didn't apply any ferts or anything, but my top-dressing is from a very rich, established bed it's gotta be 50% myco hyphae's by weight lol, that's why there's dead roots as part of top-dressing is because it's just some handfuls from that bed I 'seed' all new containers this way & it seems to be going well enough

I don't know if I should use my mister bottle and/or setup more wind screening. I took pains to ensure the growing-tips / apical buds of the highest (remaining) shoots of all limbs, in fact the apical buds of all remaining shoots, were left intact...I do however "thin out" the Podo after doing the trunk-chops, removing about 1/5th of the shoots (just clean nips with knob cutter)

Thanks a TON for any advice on this one!!

 

[BrightsideB]

Looks like it was healthy. You did a lot of work will be interesting to see how it recuperates. Seems like you are taking good care of it.

 

[luvinthemountains]

Nice! Looks a bit like mine. I remember reading someplace that in the landscape, transplant shock is reduced with podocarpus by increasing watering significantly. Not sure if the same applies in a container, though...

 

[SU2]

Looks like it was healthy. You did a lot of work will be interesting to see how it recuperates. Seems like you are taking good care of it.

Thanks! Gotta say I'm more-than just a lil nervous, having this thing survive with that trunk & the rootplate cut the way it was would just be a dream for me I have yearned for one of these for ages (think I mentioned I'd broken down and just started seedlings, have several that I figured I'd just start working as-bonsai in several years once they thickened, so finally >5yrs of looking and finally find a good sized Podo!)

You assess it as healthy- I did too- but my biggest reservation was the black scale insects, the overall vigor of the specimen didn't seem affected yet but I don't know how quickly scale bugs can take-over I have little/no experience with them....I do know of yard-grown Podo's that have this black scale, and have had it for years, they don't seem so lush/vigorous but they survive..

Will certainly update, this "Buddhist Pine" Podo will likely become one of my favorite specimen if it makes it

[PS- physical agitation seems to work for the black-scale-insects or sooty-mold whatever that stuff is, if I have the hose misting while massaging foliage it does "clean it up"! Don't wanna do the entire crown but did clean some areas up ;D ]

 

[SU2]

Nice! Looks a bit like mine. I remember reading someplace that in the landscape, transplant shock is reduced with podocarpus by increasing watering significantly. Not sure if the same applies in a container, though...

This is cool to hear, thanks a TON for taking the time to post!! I have a verrry rapid-drain mixture, wasn't sure if a bit dry, or bit wet, was smarter, so aimed to make the soil one that would always be moist AND always have plenty of aeration so it's a "no fines" mix (not many 'mediums' either it's a "large particle orchid mix" basically), and was watering it by:
- crown: misted with moderate intensity 2-4x/day (ie whenever I'm hosing-down the whole garden)
- substrate: 2x/3d seems what this substrate & location require for properly-wetted substrate, and I use rainwater for this

Hearing you say that makes me want to improve the water I'm giving it, am GG setup one of the 5gal's with rainwater plus a handful of my super-myco soil, and a handful of ground-up sphagnum, to let it sit and just begin getting the Podo's water from there ;D Had used a good tight handful (more like 2 actually )of sphagnum in my top-dressings so that waterings "pull down" the goodies in it but like the idea of fortified water

 

[luvinthemountains]

am GG setup one of the 5gal's with rainwater plus a handful of my super-myco soil, and a handful of ground-up sphagnum, to let it sit and just begin getting the Podo's water from there ;D Had used a good tight handful (more like 2 actually )of sphagnum in my top-dressings so that waterings "pull down" the goodies in it but like the idea of fortified water

Wow, I think that is three things I have never heard of in one post.

What is a "GG setup"?

"Super-myco soil"...I am assuming this is soil inoculated with mycorrhizae? So you make kind of a tea for watering with?

And then, sort of like the above, it sounds like you use water infused with sphagnum moss? Can you share a link with more info on this? I could not find anything with some brief Google research.

Thanks!

 

[SU2]

Wow, I think that is three things I have never heard of in one post.

What is a "GG setup"?

"Super-myco soil"...I am assuming this is soil inoculated with mycorrhizae? So you make kind of a tea for watering with?

And then, sort of like the above, it sounds like you use water infused with sphagnum moss? Can you share a link with more info on this? I could not find anything with some brief Google research.

Thanks!

gg = gonna/gotta go

Happy to hear your 1st sentence and hope I can explain them to your satisfaction You can probably make it 4 things if you read the post I just put here https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/clip-and-grow-appreciation-thread.50849/page-2#post-878724 (actually I KNOW you will because I've never heard of my 'bend&grow' technique ever, am sure others do it too but have never heard of it)

"Super myco soi"....most all plants, including trees, have a very significant symbiotic relationship w/ fungi and the resultant 'combo' of fine feeder roots being up-against the fine hyphae of the fungi is termed 'mycorhhizae' The hyphae greatly expand potential water&elements uptake from the soil, and the tree gives them some photosynth'd carbs in return, a great symbiotic relationship (it's FAR deeper than that and still being studied, sadly the talent & $ aren't there for this the way they are for tech or even war....but it's looking like the crazy "alive soil" in the film Avatar may be a closer reality here on earth than anyone coulda ever guessed!)
But yes if a tree is in-ground it is likely already in a proper symbiosis -- container-gardening is a different animal though, so yes I innoculate my otherwise sterile substrates (no need to make tea's, I can simply grab a handful of the wood-mulching on my raised beds, or a handful of soil from another container, it's all covered in that fine white webbing (mycorrhizae) and just mixing-in a good lil % of that to my mixes lets me innoculate just fine, I also - speculation here - also think that having wood-mulch as part of my substrate mixtures greatly helps things since the myco seem to be most-robust when they have a good wood-source to consume!)
(googling will give links on this, you may wanna check youtube for an awesome ~10-15min video by National Geographic on the subject of myco, but research shows it is useful for cotnainers but not for in-ground plants, and the reason/mechanism for this should be pretty self-evident )

Re sphagnum moss.....I wish I could remember chemical names but it's good for reasons beyond stuff like mere pH, CEC or whatever, there's chemicals in it that help with rooting, maybe someone else can chime-in...but yeah to take-advantage of that I always use my sphagnum-water (you gotta ring it in water before use, it's very hydrophobic when dry) always pour that water over a my favorite trees or recently-established trees if I have any

 

[SU2]

Funny aside I figured to toss-in here: I also use styrofoam pretty extensively!! Perlite is great but heavier & costlier, so - especially when I have to filll a giant grow-box for some >1' trunked BC - I'll use a ton of crushed styrofoam in my mixes

 

[SU2]

[Podocarpus yamma] Hoping for some thoughts/input on my next step(s) with this unsightly "clump" Podocarpus stock I have here!

So I sought this specie for many years - it's crazy-popular here but nobody who owns one is looking to get-rid of it so never got a chance at a yamadori til I literally caught a curbside one that luckily survived (thread here on that guy...

www.bonsainut.com

^ Updated thread on this, my 1st ever Podo (yamadori, I have a couple seedlings as I'd given-up waiting to find a yamma of real size!)

Ready to go out and:

- Trunk-chop the leads back to the lowest or 2nd-lowest buds (so that I can **begin** letting my actual primaries grow, especially each trunk's top/leader primary), will probably seal wounds (actually it's a conifer so maybe that's pointless?) but once-again the thing will have "most of" its foliage removed;

- slip-potted into a proper grow-bag, now that it's proven its transplant-survival and is growing well I do not want to start growing a crappy root system and (IMO) grow bags should be damn-near requisite when considering how to "develop from scratch" a bonsai-root-system!!

- continue upping its feeding schedule (after letting it recover 1-3wks from the intervention...basically as long as it takes to start active vegetative growth in earnest again, is when I'll begin giving it some nutes, then will increase back to the level it's on now which is 6N (with micro's / etc and pH balanced) right now about 2-3x/wk but remember I'm in FL and it's rainy season so I get heavy automatic-flushing this time of year!!