About 20-25 years ago, I felt much like you do. I was very enamoured of the plants and intuitively knew it could be richly rewarding. What I hadn't yet realized is that the only way to be reasonably satisfied with the fruits of my efforts, I'd need to become much more proficient at keeping my plants alive and healthy. A revolving door plant policy is costly in terms of both $ and frustration.

In other words, I failed due to insufficient knowledge. Not to be easily discouraged, I put the plants away and began to concentrate on the physiology of woody plant material, and things like soil science and nutrition. After several years of fairly diligent studying, I started getting back into the actual growing of plants and found I was able to keep them alive and healthy.

Many people test the waters, only to run up against the wall of frustration for the same reason I did - the inability to keep plants alive. Bonsai is a commitment. You might miss a feeding or watering or two with pets, but with a bonsai, missing a watering may be pivotal between life and death or serious damage.

If you're serious about bonsai, learn all you can about the science of growing as fast as you can. It will serve you very well in all your future growing endeavors, as 95% of what you'll learn about your woody charges will apply to ALL plants.

Bonsai isn't "A" type of tree, it's a way of manipulating trees to create something as close as possible to an old tree that Mother Nature might have sculpted herself. Some few bonsai may be toxic to pets, but since there are hundreds of potential species and cultivars suitable for bonsai, you can easily work around that issue with a little research.

The very young who are possessed of a great deal of enthusiasm have the potential to go very far in bonsai. Most people come to bonsai later in life. I fell in love with it as soon as I discovered it, and I've worked toward improving my skills ever since. I only regret that I didn't discover it with the same enthusiasm I have now, at your age.

I wish you lots of good luck & successes. Read read read, my friend, and put your hands on lots of trees. You'll be richly rewarded soon enough.

Al

any suggestions to what i should plant? Something where u dont need to buy...

Are you talking about planting in the ground to develop future bonsai, or planting seeds in pots & waiting, which will take much longer because trees grow slowly in pots compared to in the ground? Consider adding where you live to your user info (as in my z5b-6a mid-MI). That would be helpful for those wanting to help with advice.

Al

well over the winter i want to plant something indoor then once spring comes i will plant outside. i live in the Chicago land IL (dont know what that is in numbers...) but i want a indoor bonsai. Any idea?

I'm still a little confused about your use of 'plant' - try (buying) a Green Island Ficus or a schefflera. Both are pretty tough and forgiving plants that do reasonably well in dry indoor conditions. They like bright light ..... and be careful about how you water.

Al

Thanks!

Another fun way to get into it is something called Bonchi, or bonsai chile peppers.

Basically, trees take years to grow big enough from seeds to make good bonsai, but pepper plants will grow big enough in a single summer. Not only that, but peppers are tough plants, once you get them growing good its very hard to kill one so its okay if you mess up on it once in a while. Plus, you get to eat the peppers it makes both before and after you turn it into a bonsai! I don't know about you, but I think plants that make stuff you can eat are a lot more fun than the ones you just sit there and look at.

This is the route I like to go, because it lets me grow all sorts of weird peppers during the summer, and then making bonsais out of them in the fall so that there's always something to do. And whats even better, you can get pepper seeds for "free" at any grocery store! Just find a pepper that you think looks good, buy it, and before you cook it up to eat it, just cut it open and take out the seeds. They'll grow great, and you won't have to go to any kind of special store to get them.

I put a link on the basics of how to do it all at the bottom of this post, check it out!

Here is a link that might be useful: www.fatalii.net/bonchi/