Will the "huge trunk, no nebari" trend be the future of bonsai?

[Canada Bonsai]

There can be no good bonsai without good nebari

I guess it depends on what one means by nebari

 

[Gabler]

Also, not to toot my own horn, but there’s several of us who took up this joke challenge as a serious learning opportunity:

Gabler’s 27-Year Nebari Challenge

https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/contest-for-2023.58740/post-1017274 You may have posted it as a joke, but I’m doing it. Twenty-seven years. In case you’re wondering, I’ll be fifty-four years old twenty-seven years from today, assuming I don’t die in a car wreck or something. I collected...

www.bonsainut.com

 

[Cajunrider]

If this is the new trend, my trees are ready for Kokufu…

Since Batman is always vigilant, he is ready.

Also, not to toot my own horn, but there’s several of us who took up this joke challenge as a serious learning opportunity:

Gabler’s 27-Year Nebari Challenge

https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/contest-for-2023.58740/post-1017274 You may have posted it as a joke, but I’m doing it. Twenty-seven years. In case you’re wondering, I’ll be fifty-four years old twenty-seven years from today, assuming I don’t die in a car wreck or something. I collected...

www.bonsainut.com

I will be a few years shy of 100. I am also claiming Batman as the front runner.

 

[BonsaiPoppie]

This was essentially what I was trying to touch on, not trying to generalize anybody. But ultimately there are patterns one can see from miles away. And well, if the shoe fits.....

With an 11 EEEE, the shoe will not fit me.

 

[BonsaiPoppie]

I curse and moan and stumble carrying almost any tree nowadays...

I hear ya brother. I wear a back brace now when I do bonsai.

 

[Cadillactaste]

Well, um, same is true for feminine trees. Women, particularly older women, tend to be drawn to delicate, fussy, or cutesy thin trunked trees. I've seem some skinny trunked trees that are pretty ugly...just sayin...

12 inch pot...far from Feminine. I am more drawn to the unusual... Acer Tim Burton a friend named it. William doesn't name trees either. So an honor.

But I do...love an ugly tree too. I don't want cute. I don't do cute. I do...weird.

 

[Clicio]

But I do...love an ugly tree too. I don't want cute. I don't do cute. I do...weird.

Aha! Now we're talking!
I love weird too.

 

[namnhi]

What I have is the Root Slayer Drain Spade XL. I will not accept any other model or substitute. The 18" long narrow but thick blade wins me over. This thing is like a sharp-shooter shovel on steroid. The blade allows me to dig narrower and deeper trench. Plus the longer blade allow me to angle from 12" out and still cut the taproot. I have one and am buying one to give to a friend.

Thank you Uncle.

 

[Kadebe]

@Clicio contemplate these highly refined jaboticabas

View attachment 488656View attachment 488657

The reason i collected them is that maybe in 10 to 15 years i can have something nice, they were free of charge too, that helps . But i do agree, they are not bonsai YET.
But i think it's worth to collect stumps like these, 30 years growing in the ground is something that can't be compared with growing in pots. Over the next years i will try to correct the nebari and develop primary branches.

For those wondering, Jaboticabas can heal those big wounds, should take probably 5 to 6 years after the first branches thicken up and start to move sap up the trunk.

Looks ideal for a nice bonsai display stand

 

[BonsaiPoppie]

12 inch pot...far from Feminine. I am more drawn to the unusual... Acer Tim Burton a friend named it. William doesn't name trees either. So an honor.
View attachment 488837
But I do...love an ugly tree too. I don't want cute. I don't do cute. I do...weird.

I love the black background.

 

[Cadillactaste]

I love the black background.

Thanks...that was a 50th birthday splurge. I told my husband...I don't like people. Please don't throw me a party. Give me money instead. ...reached out to our photographer in the next town...and he sold me on a popup backdrop. Gave me a link and everything. Easy peasy... folds into a circle. But quite large. Body shots and all that.

 

[jradics]

If this is the new trend, my trees are ready for Kokufu. Joking aside, bonsai has a very high cost to entry. Newbies just don't know that at the beginning. Which is probably a blessing, because I would not have continued with this craziness had I known all that was involved at the beginning. We tend to learn a little about bonsai and then jump in head first, not really understanding all the time, effort and skill that will need to go into this. We are in fact even resistant to tried and true advice from experts because we want to develop our bonsai faster, cheaper and without bonsai soil ("I don't need no stinkin' rules"). Then we make mistakes and have a choice of either getting with the real bonsai program or trying a different hobby.

Well, I guess there is also a middle ground - setting out to create “mediocre” bonsai. I may end up with mediocre bonsai but that wasn’t my initial goal. If one doesn’t want to take the many years to develop a tree and also doesn’t want to drop the serious coin needed to buy a more finished tree, they could opt to do bonsai a different way - nebari is basically however it grew naturally, trunk has less than ideal taper and movement etc. And the less they know, the more they think their tree is a Walter Pall creation. Ignorance is bliss and presumably they are having a good time (and maybe even selling these trees for ridiculous prices online).

There can be no good bonsai without good nebari. Frankly, in the hierarchy of bonsai components (although all are important) I would place the trunk after nebari and branch ramification, but nebari is king.

high costs, yes. I just spent $500 on lumber to make tables for my motley collection of "bonsai" projects. I am comfortable knowing I am not Walter Pall but i can still collect and tend trees in pots. Not for show, or to impress anyone, but just because.

 

[jradics]

IIRC that one is about $70-80....by the looks of it, this is the same exact thing for $45 https://www.lowes.com/pd/Radius-Garden-Kobalt-Root-Slayer-Dig-Long-Handle-Shovel/5005331949

my root slayer has a D handle

 

[Bonsai Turtle]

my root slayer has a D handle

probably like this one: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Radius-Garden-Kobalt-Root-Slayer-Dig-D-Handle-Shovel/5005331733

 

[Potawatomi13]

There can be no good bonsai without good nebari. Frankly, in the hierarchy of bonsai components (although all are important) I would place the trunk after nebari and branch ramification, but nebari is king.

Strictly perspective based comment. Many Most excellent Yamadori have poor or non existent rootage regardless of country collected from.

 

[Boulder Bear]

I've been watching the way - apparently fashionable - that people doing bonsai get all enthusiastic about big trunks with no branches, no radial roots, no interesting deadwood but...
Large.
Heavy.
Thick.
Some are literally ground trees freshly dug out from the ground, chopped down, and sold immediately.
Of course a big, impressive trunk, can be part of a good bonsai; what I question here is: what about the elegant, the tall, the flared, the literati, the forests, the small delicate flowering bonsai in a beautiful pot?
Nope. Not impressive enough.
I am talking about most new enthusiasts on the Internet groups.
For them, bigger is always better.

it’s tragic and i believe takes the artform in a sloppy direction!

that said, i personally have a JWP that has stunning bark, nice girth ratio to the size of the tree, decent branching with a bit of potential, and some solid, bordering on enviable movement and bends (while natural).

BUT, while not hving been grafted, SOMEhow the nebari and truncated base were TOTALLY neglected (cause they’re literally NONE-existent!). poor thing comes straight out of the ground, then hard cranks towards the right (again quite near literally), where the remainder of its exquisite trunk hangs near perfectly level (as u might see trees having laid over on their side, and grow hugging the ground as they develop from there).

the solution i guess was to bury ALL the severely undersized nebari, and 1/2 of the truck base attempting to disguise the atrocity.

what’s worse?? i BOUGHT the darn thing, having responded to the siren call of its AMAZING bark and stellar movement (plus i’ve seen plenty trees in nature having grown VERY similarly). it took a $2000+ tree, and made it EXTREMELY affordable!

being a maker of fine lightweight, stone pots, i paired the tree with stone material nothing short of amazing as the veins swirl and bend. I’ll make the stone block look like a natural crack opening up just enough for the tree to have what it needs to survive; while using the stone to come over the top of the 90 degree, zero nebari base (effectively hiding the gross flaw). ultimately making it look as if a seed blew under a stone overhang, sprouted, tried growing up but instead was forced to go horizontal to get out from under a rock cliff.

THAT and i’m going to deadwood the HELL out of the rest of the truncated, making the remainder of the live vein the same width as the tiny base.

so, on one hand i’m relieved to hear ur post…but the avid, passionate hobbiest in me will be SEVERELY broken hearted if this new trend u speak of has ANY staying power!!

NOT traditional bonsai (as i know it to be anyway)!! Not in ANY form to be SURE!!

 

[Boulder Bear]

I will say that I have noticed an upward trend of shohin and chuchin sized trees, somewhat being driven by the greying of some practitioners I think. But I love a good graceful and feminine style of tree in larger sized trees, and that seems to be very lacking in my view. I think the trend towards large and very masculine trees is very much the main focus these days.

i’m with YOU!!! give me a good Bunjin or literati ANY day!! WAAAAY more movement and character (and VASTLY superior deadwood)!!
NO comparison! As such, it’s the large, immobile trunks that SHOULDNT be able to compete!! just my two cents on the matter anyway.

 

[Boulder Bear]

Well, um, same is true for feminine trees. Women, particularly older women, tend to be drawn to delicate, fussy, or cutesy thin trunked trees. I've seem some skinny trunked trees that are pretty ugly...just sayin...

Sounds like ur skinny trees a PERFECTLY positioned to have some curvy movement introduced, maybe even some gentle double backs if any way possible! then develop develop DEVELOP for 2-3 years, and have some STUNNING literati (so long as ur letting one portion (area grow WILD to sacrifice later, the process should even add decent bark to the overall tree to improve the young look to them)…good luck doing ANY of that with a massive trunk already set in concrete!
only hope from there is deadwood for character (sad boring BIG tree).
but different strokes for different folks

 

[rockm]

Sounds like ur skinny trees a PERFECTLY positioned to have some curvy movement introduced, maybe even some gentle double backs if any way possible! then develop develop DEVELOP for 2-3 years, and have some STUNNING literati (so long as ur letting one portion (area grow WILD to sacrifice later, the process should even add decent bark to the overall tree to improve the young look to them)…good luck doing ANY of that with a massive trunk already set in concrete!
only hope from there is deadwood for character (sad boring BIG tree).
but different strokes for different folks

Well um this trunk on this old coast live oak is bigger than my thigh. It’s not really sad.

 

[Boulder Bear]

s

Well um this trunk on this old coast live oak is bigger than my thigh. It’s not really sad.

View attachment 612646

THATS a little different than what the post was suggesting my friend

PLUS it has some FANTASTIC movement!