Tell me why native silver maple sucks?

[MMJNICE]

It's got a little funk to the leaves, but I'm still convinced it's Saccharum. How come your not growing up then cutting down? What's the final size in your plan?

The plan for this planting is to be kept small. Kinda like a Accent planting for a larger tree, I'm purposely trying to keep it as small as possible so trying to get a big trunk isn't a concern. The rock it's planted on it only a couple of inches. Im Thinking smaller then shohin but a bit bigger then mame. It is a shame because I kinda want to see how it would do if I let it run and get bigger. I may do some cuttings if I get a couple of Pieces bigger then 4" but I doubt it. I should have took some cuttings before I chopped it back this spring. I had a about a 5" piece I cut back, dam.

 

[MMJNICE]

View attachment 551208
Silver maple from the concrete planter
View attachment 551209
Red maple

Oh yeah definitely silver maple.. must be pretty old then I would think..

 

[MMJNICE]

Oh yeah definitely silver maple.. must be pretty old then o would think..

Very nice! But now looking at the leaf structure it doesn’t resemble my silver maple leaves.

What does your silver maple leaves look like? I'm curious because all the silver maples around Dayton ohio look very much like the posted pics leaves just bigger.

 

[Dabbler]

Cool thread - there's a hug patch of these guys right buy my house - I ay have to give them a go

 

[Empty Mountain]

Here are my silver maple volunteers:

Collection June 2021:


And some pics from this month, two I repotted this spring and one I left in a grow bag in the raised bed. Presumably all are seeds from the same tree (maybe), a lot of genetic variation, the leaves from the one I left in the raised bed come out very red. They might be crossed with red maple I'm not sure. Also note the leaf size difference between the ones that were root pruned and repotted this year:

 

[Gaitano]

These are representative of the trees I have

 

[RKatzin]

I didn't read all six pages, just your intro and a few of the responses and then cut to the present so pardon me if this was already presented. I saw your header and just had to throw in dos pesos.
Man nothing sucks about these trees and like any tree you have to work within the parameters of the tree.
These are no different than many of the Japanese Maple seedlings that I have grown and developed in spite of being told that those are no good for bonsai.
I am in the end game with several with ten to fifteen years of training with well established branches and refining the canopy. Oh those long internodes and big leaves have been a nuisance all along, but with careful monitoring and maintenance I've been able to grow out some nice branches with movement. Now I'm getting these four inch internodes and a set of leaves four inches outside the canopy. Now on a, on a what, different tree, a tree with short internodes (I didn't want to say better tree) there would be three or four sets of leaves and you can cut it back to the first set of leaves and tuck it back in the canopy. On these, as with my Japanese maples, there's nothing there to cut the shoot back to. You have to push out new shoots around the base of that by cutting it to the first set of leaves and wait. It looks yucky with that prong with two leaves sticking out of the canopy, but soon it will pop several shoots and you can cut the rest of the first shoot off. You can pick and choose the new shoots and I usually cut them all out except one. Over crowding gets to be a problem real fast. I try not to get overly defined or strict with the styling. You can't make a nice tight foliage pad like you can with a Shishigashira or Kiyohime or other dwarf cultivars. It's a constant struggle and it's one I'm willing to accept to grow these wonderfully different trees.

 

[sorce]

Big leaves =Big tree.

Probably people say they suck cuz they got bad backs. Or consider themselves advanced when their minds got stuck at the beginning.

One of the worst things for Bonsai is people that got their minds stuck at the beginning.

Everything can become a bonsai if you're not a moron!

Sorce

 

[MMJNICE]

View attachment 555307
These are representative of the trees I have

They look pretty much like the posted pics from my smallest root over rock silver maple just bigger. The cut leaf section seems to be more exaggerated but pretty much the same. BTW I just Defoliated the root over rock silver ,,,call me greedy but I want to see just how small they can go... I'll post pics of the internode distance and when it leafs out again.. to be completely honest I sprayed some bug killer on the leaves and totally f-up all the tiny leaves smh.. so I had to Defoliat it completely so it will grow one more new set of leaves for the year.. they can take up to 4 or 5 Partial defoliation a year and up to 3 total Defoliations per year without worry in my Experience.

 

[MMJNICE]

Some updates of my largest silver maple and one of my smaller silver maples I've been training for 3 or 4 years now. I was very new to wiring so Wired the trunk into "Over exaggerated" (S) shape. I've been working on Ramifying the branches and have cut back the trunk more timed that I can remember on the smaller tree, but the Results are a skinny but decently tapering trunk line. Development has been very slow this season because I've been Battling black spot on all My maple stock. Mancozeb is the only thing that has kept it in check. I've had to spray once a week all summer. I'll update the fusion clump when I get the branching I'm looking for in a couple of weeks. Also add a picture of when I repotted this spring on the smaller tree,,it definitely has grown some this season but not as much as it should have

 

[MMJNICE]

I didn't read all six pages, just your intro and a few of the responses and then cut to the present so pardon me if this was already presented. I saw your header and just had to throw in dos pesos.
Man nothing sucks about these trees and like any tree you have to work within the parameters of the tree.
These are no different than many of the Japanese Maple seedlings that I have grown and developed in spite of being told that those are no good for bonsai.
I am in the end game with several with ten to fifteen years of training with well established branches and refining the canopy. Oh those long internodes and big leaves have been a nuisance all along, but with careful monitoring and maintenance I've been able to grow out some nice branches with movement. Now I'm getting these four inch internodes and a set of leaves four inches outside the canopy. Now on a, on a what, different tree, a tree with short internodes (I didn't want to say better tree) there would be three or four sets of leaves and you can cut it back to the first set of leaves and tuck it back in the canopy. On these, as with my Japanese maples, there's nothing there to cut the shoot back to. You have to push out new shoots around the base of that by cutting it to the first set of leaves and wait. It looks yucky with that prong with two leaves sticking out of the canopy, but soon it will pop several shoots and you can cut the rest of the first shoot off. You can pick and choose the new shoots and I usually cut them all out except one. Over crowding gets to be a problem real fast. I try not to get overly defined or strict with the styling. You can't make a nice tight foliage pad like you can with a Shishigashira or Kiyohime or other dwarf cultivars. It's a constant struggle and it's one I'm willing to accept to grow these wonderfully different anyway.

I would love to some silver maples that have been in development for 10 or 15 years!! I typed out a long response to your message about how you have to cut back branches to get leaves to grow closer to the trunk and restarting branches but somehow it got Erased. I did touch on this very topic somewhere in the post already but you Obviously know very well the fine points of developing a silver. They grow so fast that it's only a Minor annoyance not a deal breaker for me. So in 15 years have you not been able to reduce the leaves much? I was hoping that with lots of Ramification and keeping the internodes short that would greatly reduce the leaf size. I posted a picture of my silver maple root over rock that has tiny leaves and rediculous short internodes so that gave me some hope it was possible. I've if I can't keep the leaves smaller I still like working with the species. Please post some pictures of you silver maples that you have been training for over 10 years. I think everyone would be interested in seeing something like that.

 

[MMJNICE]

I slip potted my root over rock silver into a cheap bonsai pot. The leaves after the Unscheduled Defoliation didn't reproduce smaller leaves as I had hoped. They are still quiet small but the Intranodes keep getting longer and longer the last set of leaves the distance was about an inch. I'm hoping they will not get much longer .. my next tool in my belt is I'm gonna to Withhold high nitrogen fertilizer to try to keep internode distance from getting larger. I'm completely happy growing my "trash tree" as some would call it.. nobody will ever give me 300 bucks for my little tree but I like it. I plan on wrapping the roots with Plastic wrap or foil around the rock next growing season to get the roots to Attach to the rock firmly.

 

[Gaitano]

I like this tree a lot. The dense canopy looks great. When I did my last root over rock trident I wrapped the roots and rock with Saran Wrap and it worked well. I buffered the two with sphagnum, I believe.

 

[Attmos]

I've one I've been playing with for four or five years but getting nowhere. I can't get a second flush after pruning. It just sets buds for next year. Bugs eat it like crazy. But... I keep trying.View attachment 503118View attachment 503119View attachment 503131

It's been super hot in Ohio recently and only now are my trees starting to grow on top again. I think the heat coupled with a poorly timed defoliation killed my two silver maples. I've still got them potted and will wait till next spring, but it isn't looking good.

 

[Orion_metalhead]

My maples are only now growing also.

 

[Orion_metalhead]

Mine

 

[MMJNICE]

I like this tree a lot. The dense canopy looks great. When I did my last root over rock trident I wrapped the roots and rock with Saran Wrap and it worked well. I buffered the two with sphagnum, I believe.

So did you rap sphagnum under the saran rap or rap or sphagnum over the saran rap and roots? I'm a bit confused now.

 

[Gaitano]

I’ll have to look for photos later. I arranged the roots where I wanted them on the rock and put sphagnum over the roots then I wrapped the whole thing with Saran Wrap. The rock was buried in the pot so just the tip was poking out.

 

[Gaitano]

One thing I forgot to add. I wrapped cotton string around the outside of
The plastic wrap to keep it all tight together.