What the most rare bonsai tree you own ?

[rockm]

Metrosideros - New Zealand Christmas tree. Common tree but I've not seen it used for bonsai by anyone else in the US.

How about a weird, American elm looking tree with corky elm bark? https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/very-corky-american-elm.36222/#post-608768

metrosideros--

New Zealand Christmas Tree (Pohutukawa)

I was walking through a nursery yesterday with my parents when one of the workers noticed my father looking at some boxwoods for bonsai practice material. He saw that we were looking for thick trunks and told us he had "something special" in the back. This turned out to be a New Zealand...

www.bonsainut.com

I also think the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum has one also, or maybe that's a Christmas Berry...

 

[BrianBay9]

Carol83 has some seeds which she is growing

They're a popular street tree in the San Francisco bay area. I grabbed seeds from them and started from scratch too!

 

[BrianBay9]

metrosideros--

New Zealand Christmas Tree (Pohutukawa)

I was walking through a nursery yesterday with my parents when one of the workers noticed my father looking at some boxwoods for bonsai practice material. He saw that we were looking for thick trunks and told us he had "something special" in the back. This turned out to be a New Zealand...

www.bonsainut.com

I also think the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum has one also, or maybe that's a Christmas Berry...

Thanks for the link. I had missed that one

 

[Pixar]

New Zealand Christmas tree ( Pohutukawa ) are plant everwhere by the local councils ( mostly on the street verge )
People don't bother with bonsai on these tree cause they are seen so much ( native here in NZ )

 

[Carol 83]

New Zealand Christmas tree.

I have some seeds sent to me from @Pixar . But none have come up yet.

 

[Carol 83]

Carol83 has some seeds which she is growing

I posted my reply before I saw yours. Hopefully, some will come up. Some of the other ones you sent are growing!

 

[Lorax7]

My rainbow eucalyptus is arguably the unicorn of bonsai hahaha. Seeds for rainbow eucalyptus are sold everywhere (Amazon, eBay, Etsy) for bonsai and discussed even on BonsaiNut in a thread more than a decade ago. Yet a bonafide bonsai of rainbow eucalyptus is never seen. I've searched for one off and on for the last 3 years. Mine is no exception. I tried and only get it to barely look like a prebonsai. Here is a link to one on Etsy being sold as a rare bonsai. Yet that one actually is less than 2 years old in my estimate.

Yeah, rainbow eucalyptus are indeed rare as bonsai. I thought perhaps I'd see one exhibited at the virtual World Bonsai Convention 2022 since it was hosted from Australia. I saw many other species indigenous to Australia in the exhibits but did not see even one eucalyptus bonsai.

 

[IzzyG]

A cork bark Pondo. Pretty rare mutation for Ponderosa pines.

 

[ABCarve]

Personally, I like my bonsai “well done”.

 

[Cajunrider]

Personally, I like my bonsai “well done”.

Dang!
Well done.
Then all my bonsai are rare. Some are even blue.

 

[BrianBay9]

I posted my reply before I saw yours. Hopefully, some will come up. Some of the other ones you sent are growing!

If you don't get any germinating let me know. Come fall I might be able to collect a bunch locally. When I did this a few years back I got more seedlings than I could handle.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

View attachment 467486

A cork bark Pondo. Pretty rare mutation for Ponderosa pines.

That is indeed a very rare variety of Ponderosa, and a very nice bonsai, both boxes checked. Rare botanically, and well done as bonsai.

 

[Gabler]

Rusty blackhaw Viburnum rufidulum, is not rare in its natural habitat. But I've never seen one as bonsai except for mine.

I happen to have one as a pre-bonsai, but development has proven tricky. A large section of trunk died when I chopped it, so now I have a very wide, short tree with no apex. Hopefully, I will see more progress this year.

Also, I found I was pinching off new suckers just about every day over the summer.

 

[Nybonsai12]

Probably not rare, but more uncommon in the US. I have an ungrafted Omoi no mama prunus mume ive been working for a while. its ready to flower, hopefully a good mix of the pink and white.


Mume in general aren’t super common as bonsai in the US and most of what I have seen are white flowers. I had one of those as well ungrafted too, but recently sold it.

 

[Gabler]

Does Quercus palustris count as rare? I‘m not aware of any famous examples of pin oaks in bonsai cultivation, although they grow like weeds here in their native habitat.

 

[Michael P]

I happen to have one as a pre-bonsai, but development has proven tricky. A large section of trunk died when I chopped it, so now I have a very wide, short tree with no apex. Hopefully, I will see more progress this year.

Also, I found I was pinching off new suckers just about every day over the summer.

Yes and yes! It is not an easy species to work with. Despite our long growing season, mine only has one flush of growth in the spring, and that's it. I've been meaning to start a thread about this tree.

 

[Kanorin]

The tree that's survived 4 years of me "working" on it.

 

[Gabler]

Yes and yes! It is not an easy species to work with. Despite our long growing season, mine only has one flush of growth in the spring, and that's it. I've been meaning to start a thread about this tree.

Beautiful fall color, though. Plus, the red around the leaf edges gives the foliage a nice texture.

 

[michaelj]

My rainbow eucalyptus is arguably the unicorn of bonsai hahaha. Seeds for rainbow eucalyptus are sold everywhere (Amazon, eBay, Etsy) for bonsai and discussed even on BonsaiNut in a thread more than a decade ago. Yet a bonafide bonsai of rainbow eucalyptus is never seen. I've searched for one off and on for the last 3 years. Mine is no exception. I tried and only get it to barely look like a prebonsai. Here is a link to one on Etsy being sold as a rare bonsai. Yet that one actually is less than 2 years old in my estimate.

I have one of those, grown from seed 5 years ago, and it's still just a stick in a pot.

 

[Pixar]

Nice to see all these rare bonsai tree's coming out