Was at the garden centre, are any of these good species?

[ForeverRaynning]

Young autistic, kindness and patience appreciated.

Just left the garden centre, parents were grumpy and wanted to leave so didn’t get anything, they said it was all expensive. But managed to grab some pictures of labels before we left. Would any of these be suitable for a beginner to start with?

I know green mound juniper (procumbens nana) has been mentioned to me but couldn’t see any. Did find these though, £30 a pot. Didn’t get proper pics of the pots or full plamts or anything as was getting too stressed and being rushed out. Was also very hard to work out how the planting was, if it was just 1 or multiple plants in each pot (the other labels on them just said conifer mix), and also hard to see trunks (they’re prickly plants haha, also heard they can cause skin reactions so, will be interesting to see if anything develops).

No idea what to actually look for and get overwhelmed quite easily. Parents being grumpy doesn’t help either but no one else to go with.

Tried searching on the forum the names of some of these (just the common names) but hard to find relevent stuff as it searches each word individually ie blue and/or star.

 

[Dabbler]

May be good species but none of those are really anything to look at - unless one ha s decent trunk or something like that

 

[Bonsai Nut]

The challenge with buying nursery stock from a commercial nursery that is focusing on the landscape trade is that many of the trees will have characteristics that don't always work well for bonsai. For example, I'm pretty sure all of the juniper cultivars you have pictured (even the Chinese juniper cultivar) are all needle junipers - ie they never form soft, adult scale foliage. You can certainly work with needle junipers for bonsai... but they are more challenging than getting a Juniperus chinensis 'shimpaku' - particularly one that has already been grown as pre-bonsai.

 

[Coach_]

My experience as a beginner was about the same as yours, so many oddly named Juniper varieties that it gets overwhelming. I found that if they dont have mature foliage at the nursery they probably never will, and instead of wasting a hundred dollars buying 3/4 different box store trees you could have bought 1 nice pre-bonsai online/a bonsai nursery or even 5/6 young pre-bonsai that you could grow and develop.
There is a significant lack of data on where people can find pre-bonsai from reputable dealers online. Ive found etsy to be a surprising source in the states. Cant speak for the uK.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

No idea what to actually look for and get overwhelmed quite easily. Parents being grumpy doesn’t help either but no one else to go with.

I feel your stress.
I think you want to look for something that you can easily develop into "something" right away.
None of these will be perfect for bonsai, but they can teach you the right things at this stage, and most of them are available at regular nurseries or online:

Juniperus
- procumbens
- media and/or pfitzer(iana) (all varieties)
- sabina (but avoid tamariscifolia, and/or tam no blight, they have itchy foliage that will itch for a day)
- chinensis (avoid stricta)

Pinus
- sylvestris
- nigra
- mugo
Avoid grafted varieties if possible, they are expensive and not fun to look at later on.

What should you look for?
- bushy and full plants. This way you can hack away the outside and be left with a proper inside that you can grow out and train.
- trunk line or a branch originating from the trunk that you can follow from the soil upwards, a line that goes left and right and back and forth. You can always wire more movement into it, but if you have the luxury to pick, better pick a good one.
- healthy plants. If you see a bunch of brown or grey or black, or yellow, it might not be healthy.
- the thicker the trunk, the more established the plant will look in a bonsai pot right away. We don't always have that luxury, but buying twigs will not help you move forward fast. Avoid buying them even if they are exactly what you're looking for; you will regret not saving your money for that fat trunked one you'll find three weeks later by accident.

If your parents stay grumpy, try to get them to help you find the good stuff. My mom was grumpy sometimes when I had to go through all the inventory at the garden center. So I told her what to look for and asked her to help me out.
Saved us half the time, and she developed a good eye for it. My dad doesn't have the eye, he just doesn't. But he's happy to try and help! I'm not saying your situation will be similar, but you can always ask and see where it takes you!

 

[dbonsaiw]

I tend to do my nursery tree shopping after Halloween as the nurseries are gearing up for Christmas and will significantly discount their trees. In my neck of the woods, 50% off is fairly standard and makes shopping more doable.

Choosing material for bonsai is an art in itself. And picking good material really comes down to understanding how a tree is developed into a bonsai. With a general idea of how to develop a bonsai from seedling, we quickly realize that this is going to be a very long process. Perhaps we want to shorten this process. To do this, we need to find a tree that is further along the bonsai timeline. Nursery trees can present conceptual issues for newbs as it isn't always so apparent what stage the nursery tree is in on the bonsai timeline (because it was grown for landscape). The width of the base of the trunk is easy enough to discern - we can look at a 3" nursery stock and understand that this saved me 10 years of ground growing, for example. But does the tree have any movement and taper? If not, the tree will need to be cut back (for deciduous) and a multi-year process of growing the next section of trunk begins. Scars will follow. What does the nebari look like? Many times, frankly it is crap on nursery stock - they aren't growing for bonsai after all. So we gained time with the base of the trunk, but lost time with the rest.

Not sure what your budget is, but have you checked out Herons Bonsai? I was actually on their site this morning and they have some great stuff. Wish he could ship some of those maples States-side. And one of the joys of online viewing is that parents are not required. So, win/win.

 

[ForeverRaynning]

Just been on ebay and bought myself a Procumbens Nana and a Pfitzeriana Aurea. No idea if they’re any good, seller has no pics of them at the size they’re selling at, asked for some of the procumbens but they are working remote and the warehouse is busy so I just took the plunge (and added in the pfitz as well so I have two different ones) the store has 600k+ reviews so I’m not too worried about them from a healthy plant standpoint.

They’re both in P9 pots so tbh I’m not expecting much, though the Pfitz does say 20-30cm so who knows, I may get lucky. £9.50 each, no idea if thats cheap or expensive or what but, at least when it comes to procumbens, I can’t find any locally? I know of one nursery thats maybe an hour away that stocks nana but it seems like a more expensive higher end kinda place, has won awards and such. Can find them on other online nurserys in bigger pots (2-3L) for around £12-14 but then would get hit with a £15 delivery charge on top, and with my parents saying the £30 ones at the center were expensive… well, I’d rather not have to try and justify that one, especially with over half the cost being delivery, even if it is all my own money I’m spending anyway.

So fingers crossed I get something thats not a major disappointment. Also no idea what I can even do with them at this time of year, suppose it depends on how big they are, I may have to slip-pot (I believe this is the right term?) and just wait it out till next year if its too late to do anything or if they’re too small.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Also no idea what I can even do with them at this time of year, suppose it depends on how big they are, I may have to slip-pot (I believe this is the right term?) and just wait it out till next year if its too late to do anything or if they’re too small.

Since they're conifers, don't do any root work before autumn.
You can clip off a bunch of foliage, maybe some fine wiring. It's best to not wire junipers in an active season, because the bark peels off very easily in those times and this can lead to losing branches.

So trimming and pruning? Yes.
All the rest: preferably not.

If you start a thread before you clip anything, we the forum can help you make decisions if you need it.

 

[ForeverRaynning]

Made a new thread for the junipers - here.