Tree Killers Anonymous, confess your crimes here....

[Fidur]

Not so Anonymous, but anyway I think it's good for our souls (and also for our bonsai knowledge) to confess here our worst offenses with trees.

I'll begin....

Hi, my name is Fidur and I've killed trees...
I'm not used to lose trees, but last spring-summer I was able to destroy some of them...



Somehow I created the perfect conditions (shade mess + frequent watering) for a fungal festival. When I was aware it was too late for 10 of my trees.
So my sin was not to apply an antifungic treatment in time. This year I've been doing so every 3-4 weeks, and everything has been fine.....
In fact I have been applying a systemic insecticide and a systemic fungicide (mostly in the growing season) and I think it's a must for us bonsai growers to do it.

 

[SFDrake]

Not so Anonymous, but anyway I think it's good for our souls (and also for our bonsai knowledge) to confess here our worst offenses with trees.

I'll begin....

Hi, my name is Fidur and I've killed trees...
I'm not used to lose trees, but last spring-summer I was able to destroy some of them...

View attachment 607005

Somehow I created the perfect conditions (shade mess + frequent watering) for a fungal festival. When I was aware it was too late for 10 of my trees.
So my sin was not to apply an antifungic treatment in time. This year I've been doing so every 3-4 weeks, and everything has been fine.....
In fact I have been applying a systemic insecticide and a systemic fungicide (mostly in the growing season) and I think it's a must for us bonsai growers to do it.

Do you mind providing the brand of systemic you are using? I am having some issues with the humidity here in Florida

 

[Fidur]

Do you mind providing the brand of systemic you are using? I am having some issues with the humidity here in Florida

I don´t mind, but be aware that those brands are unlikely to be sold there, and anyway I choose them just because those were the ones I found in my local garden center, and not necessarily the best...

 

[SFDrake]

Indeed, Spain is a bit far from me. This is what i purchased, but im hesitant to use it because the dosage instructions are for large trees and I don't want to wipe out my whole garden at once

 

[Cadillactaste]

I've not killed many trees. While earlier this year...down with pneumonia with compromised lungs...9 prescriptions. Total daft in a medicated fog. I gave an incorrect watering schedule for my tropical. My ficus recovered... my bougainvillea I've had since 2015...never recovered. I monitored watering the pathetic thing...and finally gave up come July. It was toast. But my heath is good...and my trees from Jerry Meislik ...recovered. If I had to choose a loss between those two...and they suffered the most. I'm glad my Natalensis Ficus from Jerry recovered. posted it on Instagram today. I'm glad it did so well. It was the only Ficus to fully defoliate. Yet made a full recovery with no dieback

 

[nuttiest]

Thank you Fidur. I needed this juniper photo. Feeling so bad about mine this summer.

 

[leatherback]

I killed my first 1KE tree. I bought a nice yamadori for my Nippon Bonsai Bonsai Techer qualification exam. Did a decent styling of it in fall. Then in spring I saw candles extending everywhere, the odd backbud showed up. So when I saw the first needles form I made that mistake everybody has and I should have learned to control. The urge of impatience.. and decided: Let's get it out of these ugly skewed plastic pots and into the bonsai pot.

It stopped pushing. I watched it over summer decline untill it was brown in fall.
I have the corpse sitting between 2 other old pines that are waiting for a styling session (this winter?). A strong reminder. Go Slow.

Repotting Pine is my Achylles Heel. I have absolutely no feeling for pine roots.

 

[Shibui]

Do you mind providing the brand of systemic you are using? I am having some issues with the humidity here in Florida

Brands vary from place to place. It is more useful to know the active ingredient, then you can search locally for a product with the same actives.

 

[stubmle]

I killed a nice larch through a combination of beginner mistakes, neglect, and bad luck. Did great all last year, very vigorous, tons of growth. Decided to wire it in midwinter since I read that was an appropriate time. Not sure if I overworked the branches or it suffered some winter injury due to weather or drying out, but come spring only about half the branches leafed out. Despite this growth was decent in the spring- not as vigorous as last year but nothing too concerning. Then some creature got ahold of it and stripped off a ton of foliage. It pushed new growth and I thought it was going to make it... until we had a record breaking heat wave while I was away from home. This was too much and it has since dropped all foliage. I'm holding out hope it will somehow revive but I fully expect to be disappointed.
Main lesson learned: practice wiring on crappy trees first and observe how they react. Better to make mistakes on expendable material. The other mistakes I made here are just due to lack of discipline or preparation.

 

[SailDesign]

30 years ago, I killed a whole bunch - the kids still tease me about it. So I stopped killing trees, until a couple of months ago when my wife decided I should try again.

Fingers crossed.

 

[Lara_Ericacious]

This year I collected a cool douglas fir too late in the season. My reasoning being that it was very remote and there's a chance I wouldn't see it again.


After digging it up I was certain it wouldn't survive as I lost the majority of its roots.
Eventually got it home. Potted and tied down in pumice. All but one branch massively declined until brown and needle drop.
I removed the dead branches to allow light into the remaining branch. But with a fortnight it had also died



Pulled it out the pot and chucked it because I have limited space. Plus I need to move on and not wallow in my mistake

Thanks

E.L.L

 

[stewarjm192]

I lost this Larch this year...The woes of cold storage. It got cooked and it was all downhill from there. Unfortunately it was no ones fault really, as I left trees to the care of a house sitter, and I failed to be particular about some of the important parts of cold storage theory lol..We win...We lose

 

[stubmle]

I lost this Larch this year...The woes of cold storage. It got cooked and it was all downhill from there. Unfortunately it was no ones fault really, as I left trees to the care of a house sitter, and I failed to be particular about some of the important parts of cold storage theory lol..We win...We lose

View attachment 608994

RIP, that was a nice tree.
On the bright side, larch wood does not decay readily, and can be used for tanuki or jin implants! I'm saving the corpse of my larch for use as an implant in the future.
In the meantime it is a reminder to do better!

 

[Kodama]

My condolences for your losses. If you need a counseling support thread here you go. https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/accepting-the-pain-of-loss.69415/