I've grown a black elderberry (Sambucus nigra 'Black Lace'?) in a container for a long time (not as a bonsai - as a specimen tree) and I was never impressed with how it responded to pruning. I think elderberry can be done, but its compound leaves leave it primarily as a candidate for larger bonsai. FWIW - almost everyone going through the garden mistook the Sambucus above as a Jap maple. They look quite a bit like one of the dissectum maples, only the foliage is coarser, and of course, nearly black.

The plum can definitely be done.

I'm going to be addressing a large group with a talk about bonsai in less than 2 weeks. One of the challenges I have is describing to people who have no bonsai experience, just what bonsai is. I haven't fully worked it out yet, but I'm going to compare it to other forms of container gardening. Bonsai is a discipline. It's a form of container culture, the difficulty level of which is several levels above those required to maintain houseplants, mixed floral plantings, and crops like tomatoes, cucumbers and others. As a discipline, you pass through stages of development - like you might as a martial arts student, starting as a white belt when a beginner and progressing upward through the belt ranks as you improve in your discipline. The difference between the growth in martial arts and many other disciplines is there are no AWARDS as you progress, only REWARDS - personal rewards. There is also no limit to what you CAN learn. In many disciplines, there is a plateau, an upper limit beyond which it is very difficult to progress, but with bonsai, there is no such limit. The best of the masters are still striving to learn new things and techniques ..... to improve their skill sets every day. In bonsai, the most profound limitation to success is our own level of dedication.

Read your book - get another and another and another, if you're really interested in bonsai. Learn all you can from books and let your practical experience validate what you've learned. Don't make observations and invent reasons YOU think are reasonable to fit those observations. Most of the arguments that occur on these pages come as a result of people inventing science to explain what they see, instead of doing it the other way around. ;o)

Don't just read books about bonsai. If you don't gain enough knowledge in the area of plant physiology and soil science, you'll quickly become frustrated by your inability to keep plants alive and healthy. Bonsai is extremely rewarding, but there are dues to pay if you want to be assured of progress and success.

Good luck - keep asking questions - join a club - find a mentor that knows what he's doing if you possibly can.

Best to you.

Al

Thank you. I actually have been reading up on bonsai for a long time, and have successfully done some dwarf euphorbias and ficus, the easy stuff. The ficus benjamina was actually a large bonsai I kept in a 7 gallon pot for 10 years, and had to root prune it ever year to do so. You know how fast those suckers grow! It was 6 feet in a 10 gal. pot when I got it for free from a woman who didn't want it anymore, and I cut it down to 18" and kept it under 3' the whole time. Finally gave it to a neighbor and he left it outside and let it freeze. 10 years for nothing. Ticked me off. When he came begging for more plants, guess what I said?

I'm moving to Gainesville, FL, home of University of FL, so I'm sure there are going to be some bonsai enthusiasts there, as it is the agricultural college with one of the top horticulture schools in the nation.