Let’s talk a little bit about different kinds and styles of bonsai. Bonsai come in just about any kind of tree you can imagine. One of the mistakes people make is they think bonsai is a species of tree, and it’s not. It is an art form, and that art form is keeping trees of all species in a miniature form. This particular Japanese red pine, as you can see in my hand, is quite old, about thirty or forty years old as is this larger Japanese Black pine, which is about the same age. They are just grown under different conditions and cared for a little differently. Believe it or not, this is actually a Juniper. It’s a kind of an unusual variety called a Needle Juniper, most Needle Junipers are very sharp needles, like their name would imply. However, this particular one is very soft. It’s just a very fun type of bonsai to grow and they are very adaptable; they grow very well outdoors not indoors. This one is a little Chinese Elm, and this one is actually a dwarf species so that it actually has smaller leaves and it has a white fringe on the new leaves in the spring; it’s very pretty. This is Ginkgo Bulba, it’s a very old, or ancient, species of tree and it’s just unusual and we enjoy it very much. This particular tree is probably about twenty five years old. These are Korean Horn Beam, and different sizes that came from Korea. We’re now in late summer and some of the leaves are starting to show the wear and tear of summer’s heat. By and large they do quite well here. A very good tree, a very sturdy tree; outdoors definitely it will take about all the cold weather you can give them. This particular tree is one of the most unusual trees in my collection simply because I know about how old it is; it’s over a hundred years old. It’s a Japanese Boxwood and it came from a nursery in California where it was used as a stock plant for creating cuttings for many years. This particular bonsai is a Juniper growing on a rock and this is a Juniper that most people are familiar with when thinking about bonsai. It’s a green mound Juniper, and I’ve had it for a bonsai for about thirty years and it is one of the last trees I did with my first bonsai teacher. I’d like to show you two different bonsai, two different Maples. This is a Japanese Maple, and really looking really fine this year. Some years the leaves burn in late summer. This is the Trident Maple, which is probably the most common Maple that we grow in the south because it just endures the heat better. But, both of them are just nice examples of how we grow bonsai.
johanna4
Aug 02, 2008
I have done the beginners course and found this video series helpful in reinforcing all the different aspects I have learnt. Very clear demonstrative video. Thank you Johanna