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whnthewallsbend

Form and Style help!

whnthewallsbend
15 years ago

Hello!

I bought a golden gate ficus "bonsai" from walmart because the trunk shape was very appealing to me. I have since repotted it into a bonsai pot and have covered the soil with moss. It's doing very well and looks much better out of the crappy walmart pot. My only complaint is all the severed limb knots... oh well.

I was wondering if any of you would have any advice or ideas about where I should go with it now in regards to it's final shape and design. I have some ideas bit just wanted to get some other opinions. Thanks!

{{gwi:12361}}

Comments (3)

  • tapla (mid-Michigan, USDA z5b-6a)
    15 years ago

    I can tell from your post that what I would do with the tree, now and over the long haul, varies significantly from your intent, but if you're interested, I'll share what I would do.

    Al

  • whnthewallsbend
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Any and all help no matter what would be greatly appreciated!
    Thank you tapla in advance.

  • tapla (mid-Michigan, USDA z5b-6a)
    15 years ago

    I'm going to tell you what I would say if I was conducting a workshop & you had just acquired the tree & were ready to go to work on it. I would think: For any upright or slant style, the trunk is much to long and has no taper. The exaggerated bends in the trunk identify the plant immediately as a cookie cutter import. I need to do something to shorten the tree and get rid of the 1 of a million instead of 1 in a million look. Two options jump out at me immediately.

    If you want an upright tree, I would start by cutting the tree back very hard. I would cut the strong branches back to 1 leaf and the weaker branches back to 2 leaves to force something to break back on the trunk near the first bend. When something breaks there, I would start training that new growth as the new top. I would train the first 3-4 inches of the new top as part of the end composition, and then leave the rest of the top to grow unpruned until the taper looks like it belongs with the older part of the trunk.

    Next spring, I would air-layer off the top & make another tree with an appropriate height to trunk diameter ratio. When I separate the air-layer, I would shorten the trunk below the air-layer back to just above the branch that is being trained as the new top. Now you have 2 trees that are more in balance - trunk diameter to trunk height, and have gotten rid of the 'typical' look these trees usually come to the end grower with.

    If that idea puts you off, you could make a nice cascade or semi cascade out of it rather quickly. As you look at the photo, the tree is planted at approx a 60* angle. If you inclined it further, to around a 10-15* angle, the tree presents several semi-cascade styling opportunities. I envision 3 foliage pads. The first would be developed from the branch that points to the 'S' in the poster. Remove the tuft of branches behind that branch immediately, before it causes unsightly, localized thickening in the cascading branch. The second foliage pad would be developed from a branch in what is the apex as you view the tree as it is shown now. The third pad would be developed from the very small branch on the left in the photo. It would be trained back to the left (after the tree is repositioned, downward as it looks now) to form the apex, which would sit about midway between the cascading branch and the nebari.

    Al

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