What soil do you use for "pre-bonsai" or stock in training?

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Nope it didn't, i thought they needed more/much organic 'real' soil (compost/potting soil), and now they all have wet feet and dieying on me (2 of them gave up and drowned), i learned/and still are learning alot (the hard way). Most of them are free or collected so it's not that bad but i don't like watching dieying plants. (4 hornbeams (not healthy) and 1 dogwood (dead) and a collected unknown species (dieying).

Thanks for the reply, answers to these questions can be all over the map, obviously many different soils work, its useful to hear what doesn't work too.

 

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5 part pine bark? Really?

I'll second that, really?
Not being critical, just curious, some of the healthiest roots systems I've seen on nursery stock have been in a soil that looks like 100% decomposed wood particles. A local nursery here brings those in from a nursery in Oregon actually.