Ficus Update

Here is a bit of an update on the ficus you've seen here before. You can click on the title for a link back to previous posts.

The tree grew wonderfully for the next two months. By May, it had gotten away from the shriveled leaves from its recovery.

With the warm summer weather (what we had of it was in July), the tree really accelerated its growth.

(When a pack of cigarettes is not available, a pop can may be substituted as a measuring device.)


By the end of July, the tree was ready to be defoliated. After much staring, I decided that the new leader should be encouraged to grow by removing everything else, thusly:

I noticed that the large aerial root on the right in the final photo supported a branch that would not come down without major work, but decided to keep it all as it is, and use it as a sub-apex to produce a lower crown there. It's a bit unorthodox for bonsai, but I think it will work very well. Here's a crude diagram of what I hope to accomplish:


Hey. I said it was crude! All in all, it's been a real pleasure working on this tree for the last two years and seeing it respond so well.

Privet Update

I posted this tree after collecting it this spring (04/01/09). Others have since identified it as a privet, which I found quite interesting since they are so prevalent in Britain but not here so much. And there it was, thriving in a hedgerow at Pavement Ends.

It budded out so well, I decided to chop it early instead of waiting a year. It was quite vigorous, and so I chopped it way back (04/26/09). It tends to sprout a lot of suckers at the base, so I have worked to keep those cut back.

It's been quite a cool and wet summer, so watering has been no problem this year. Only one month later (05/29/09), I had quite a lot to work with.

I thinned out the branches I was not going to use, and wired the rest, waiting for the wire to bite in. I put a good deal of movement in the base of these future branches, trusting the scars from the wire biting in to disappear fairly quickly, and to aid in holding the branches in their position. The following pictures are from 7/12/09.

I will photograph again as soon as I complete soji (cleanup) on this tree for fall. I have been quite pleased with its development.

The New Hoop House

John Kirby came by last Sunday with some materials and expertise, and helped me get set up with my first hoop house. My trees have been languishing with the small windows as you see in the shop behind the hoops. So here we are with a great place to work on and store my trees. I can't thank John enough.

The first photo shows the back of the house which I had to cover with exterior plywood paneling. As you can see, the back of the shop also has new siding on it. This is the west face, from which we get all of our heavy winds and weather. In fact, we've been working on storm damage since May and have finally gotten it all just about taken care of.

I couldn't take any photos while we were working, since it was just the two of us, but I hope I can show enough of the construction to give a good idea of how it is built. Each hoop is two full 10' pieces of toprail for chain link (hurricane) fence, bent and joined at the top. We used 1X4 pressure treated lumber for corner bracing to hold up the two end hoops which we then tied with a perling at the top. The straps you can see at the perlings really clamp the thing together and strengthen the structure.

Once the ends were up, we put up the two middle hoops and tied everything together with two more perlings. Then 2X6 lumber to tie the ends of the hoops into a structure, and we used more 2X6s laid flat across the ends. We framed a 48 inch wide door at each end, starting with the top of the jamb which we just centered and tied to the top of the hoop with "plumber's tape" and then went from there. There wasn't a tremendous amount of careful measurement needed, and we used screws to attach all the lumber.

This is the east end, which I covered with more plastic. The black nylon strapping you see is what we use to staple through to keep the plastic secure. That will also reveal the shape of the framing. You can run your angled lumber all the way up to the top, but we were limited in the lumber we had so worked with the lengths we had. It became incredibly sturdy by the time we were finished!


Above, you can see the angled brace which we then tied to the base, as well as a bit of detail on the framing. Below, a detail of the base of the house, showing the "plumber's tape" we used to anchor to rebar driven into the ground. One screw on each side will tighten this up significantly.


In all, it was a great day working in the coldest weather so far this season, and John went a long way out of his way to help me do this. I can't thank him enough.

Post-Dated, by Michael Hagedorn

Post-Dated: The Schooling of an Irreverent Bonsai Monk
By Michael Hagedorn
Portland, OR, Crataegus Books
2008, 215 pp., paper. $14.95
Reviewed by Chris Johnston

This little book caught me by surprise. Divided into two parts, serendipitously named Part 1 and Part 2, Michael Hagedorn goes beyond the simple memoir of a trying time as a Japanese-style bonsai apprentice and touches the essence of bonsai. His writing style is simple, straightforward, and yet quite eloquent at the same time. Using excerpts from his journals and insight gained from hindsight, he illuminates some of what Japanese bonsai is all about so that a Westerner might get a bit beneath the surface.

Part 1 deals primarily with recollections from Hagedorn's journals, providing thought-provoking and sometimes humorous excerpts from his time as an apprentice. For example, his difficulties with the Japanese language come out in this excerpt from the chapter, "Brain Misfires While Speaking Japanese:

Sometimes it was tempting to plead incompetence regarding the language. I had studied Japanese for a full year before arriving in Japan, and in every class I had attempted there was a faint halo of a dunce cap sitting on my head. The brain had ossified in my thirties, seemingly unwilling to assimilate anything new of this sort. The difficulties continued while in Japan, where one would think constant verbal exposure would soften this mental geology. This was a conversation in Japanese, at teatime, going over a bit of studio inventory:
I comment: "We have long onions and short onions but no medium ones."
They stare at me, wordless.
The conversation continues and leaves me far behind, mulling over long and short
onions.
"SCREWS! Not onions, screws! Sorry!"

There are great lessons for the bonsai artist to learn in Part 1 as well. Hagedorn's metaphor of bending branches as a dance with a partner is especially enlightening. After describing the interplay between dance lead and follow, he then applies this to working with a tree.

In bonsai we are also within the tree's space, and to lead a tree well is to be familiar with it and ourselves, and to move as a unit. From this understanding a tree will be led effortlessly and naturally, as if the dance of its branches were the most natural thing in the world...One of the major challenges for bonsai artists is to arrive at this kind of organic harmony. And it's very subtle. Often we see bonsai that have a trunk and branches that do not belong with one another. They clash, forming a bizarre, confusing aesthetic. And it is in part because the natural history of that tree--a miniaturized, to some degree fictionalized, natural history--is not there.

The second part of this delightful book deals with lessons learned as a result of a shift of world-view on the part of the apprentice, perhaps after the fact. As the author says in his preface, all apprentices have certain things in common, including stress, bonsai, and sore muscles.

And yet beyond these givens, as with any adventure of this sort, you are never sure of what you might find. Inevitably, the findings are beyond calculation. We launch off confidently into a little puddle with the intent of splashing around in it for our amusement, only to discover it is less like a puddle than the deeps of the ocean with its weird and inconceivable forms and patterns--encounters and unexpected lessons entirely unrelated to the reason we jumped into the water in the firs place. The landscape of our investigation changes; our confidence waver.s We feel a clunk as some internal edifice shifts and opens a well. Part II consists of these sleeper lessons.

This portion of the book takes lessons from some Taoist works as well as an imagined dialogue between the author and Henry David Thoreau. It's more thought-provoking with less emphasis on being entertaining, and also holds some quite incisive insights. My favorite passage comes late in the book, where Hagedorn deals with the tradition of bonsai in the chapter titled (oddly enough) "Tradition."

In Obuse the months passed. From watching Mr. Suzuki's example as an artist, I learned that being unique does not equate with being weird. bonsai is an art of nuance. If we can't recognized nuance, only the weird will seem unique. Further along I learned that it is to tell a tree's story that we do bonsai. It is not to write our own story in the limbs of one. We cannot dominate a tree and expect that to be bonsai...

Another idea that took root was that bonsai is an art of reticence. We carefully enhance a tree, rather than risk obliterating something special with too much technique. When only what must be done is done, we approach the highest level of the art.

I recommend everyone interested styling and caring for bonsai buy this book, and read and re-read it as often as possible to absorb some of the inner lessons to be learned. It's a very fast read the first time through, because you won't be able to put it down. But there's so much more than a reader can get in the first reading, you will want to go back to it time and again.

The book is available from the author at www.crataegus.com

Chris Johnston

Independence Day

What is Independence Day to you? Cooking out (grilling, not to be confused with barbecuing which is smoking meat as opposed to charring burgers and dogs on a grill), picnicking, fireworks, boating, drinking, etc.? I like all those things, and think they are a big part of what makes the U.S.A. my home. The liberty to do what we wish on this birthday of our country is completely amazing.

But Independence Day is so much more. It's an anniversary of the day the United States of America declared its independence from King George of England and made it stick. It's the day the greatest Republic the earth has ever seen was born. I know there are a lot of people who want to look across the aisle from Republican to Democrat and vice versa, from liberal to conservative and vice versa, and say "I love this country (implied: more than you)."

Well, I believe that almost all Americans love their country for a myriad of reasons. I just prefer to concentrate on the things we can all agree on. Is America perfect? Of course not. But we are a country that has enshrined in its constitution the process by which we can each try to perfect her.

To that end, I want to publish again the entire text of the Declaration of Independence, that brilliant document setting forth the evidence for the need for independence:

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

We spent this morning in a Prairie Celebration of this declaration, at a historic log cabin, ca. 1859, with a traditional reading of the Declaration of Independence. It was quite moving. I love this country.

Chris

Announcing a New Bonsai Forum

This from John Callaway (Matsubonsai):

I'm very pleased to announce the debut of a new bonsai forum. Bonsai Study Group is an online forum dedicated to the advancement of bonsai trees and individuals as they work together to share their progress as a community. Testing has been underway for the past few weeks, and new members are now free to sign-up. There are already a number of very informative posts online and I suspect even more will soon follow.

Others are encouraged to share in announcing the new forum, but the administrators have asked that we be respectful of other forums. That means no announcement posts or signature lines on other forums, as this may be seen by some as disrespectful. Feel free to post an announcement on a personal blog and share the news via email or personal message, as you see fit.

I'm very excited about this new forum and look forward to seeing it grow.

http://bonsaistudygroup.com

I'm excited about this venue and have already started posting some of my existing content as well as a new article on candling Japanese black pines, titled, "Needle Therapy." You will find some top talent already there.

Here's what's got me so up about this forum. It's fairly heavily moderated with a completely unbiased hand. It's on-topic only, anything off topic or just for fun is in the chat room where we can build community and just get to know each other in real time.

No politics. No religion. No rants. No food fights. Just high quality posts by some top bonsai artists. I'm hoping some of those who have dropped out of the online bonsai world because of those kinds of things, will take a look and find a place where they can share their content in a give and take atmosphere.

Well done, John! See you there!

Ficus Update

Here's a recent picture of the ficus after chopping the trunk way back:


I put on just a bit of wire because most of the growth is too small yet to wire. I intend to make this a wider tree by quite a margin.




The growth here is small and a bit misshapen, which I have found to be the norm after a large cutback. Since these photos, more normal foliage has replaced the small stuff and the tree is growing well.

Update update: Here are two views of the tree today. It's growing well and I look forward to working it some more this summer.