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With some down time over the Christmas holidays, I finally got around to re-styling THIS TREE. It had been growing mostly untouched for a couple of years and had well and truly outgrown its former style.
As it had been left to grow a lot of the growth had become leggy and a lack of routine thinning had left fewer amounts of interior growth than i would have liked.
To get started, I began by pruning. I thinned and removed heavy and unneeded branching, upward and downward growing sub branches, thinned the foliage and generally cleaned up the structure.
As I worked I also started to play around with new front angles and didn’t mind it from a slightly counter clockwise rotated position.
I began to wire as I pruned so i could get a better sense of what branches I needed and what could be cut off. All was going well until i made an error. I wasn’t paying enough attention and when I cut off one of the branches in the top of the tree it was difficult to see from my angle that there were two branches in the branch cutters jaws…….. and as a result, i cut the key branch on the right side off.
Well, what was done was done so I continued wiring and worked a front that was much closer to the original. I was pretty annoyed with myself but there wasn’t a whole lot I could do. All in all everything was not lost but i was kicking myself for making such an avoidable mistake.
The ‘finished’ result is a good place to be for now. The styling is pretty sparse due to how much foliage and branching i removed but the trunk and deadwood are now very much more prominent.
You can probably see that the wiring I applied is only on major branches and sub branches. As this is a restyling, I will need to develop the foliage over the next 12 months or so to fill in and tighten up to this new style, so I didn’t bother fine wiring and hence the slightly scrappy appearance.
As the canopy fills in i think i will further fine tune the front. As you can see from the above image that original front is not bad but i still think i prefer the one i ended up with that is slightly rotated anticlockwise. We will see if this changes as i grow some of the branches and get some more width to things (something that i wouldn’t have to wait for if i hadn’t cut off that key branch!)
It is interesting comparing this and my other small Kishu to the itoigawa i have. It is certainly more difficult keeping these kishu small and compact compared to the itoigawa. That said, the branching stays much finer on these so i guess you have to take the good with the bad.
Next post might be an update on one of my itoigawa trees…. we will see.
Just a quick update on this tree.
I spent an evening candle cutting the new years growth with the future shape of the canopy in mine, leaving shoots i wanted to extend uncut and trimming back to leave a short section of new growth on areas i didn’t want to extend too much.
Its a bit of a fun process as you are constantly thinking to the future of the tree, what needs filling in, what needs lengthening etc, while at the same time reigning in the new season’s somewhat messy growth. I did wire a couple of branches thinking i could get away with just adjusting a couple of things but as is always the way it just highlighted further things that need adjusting…… likely meaning i need to fully re-wire at some stage.
Above: 2021 on the left, 2023 on the right.
Yet another one to add to the ‘needs to be wired list’. This tree has a long way to go but is slowly filling in and improving each time I work it. It’s a strange tree for sure but i think that’s why i often catch myself gazing at it on my benches. I like the weird.
As far as future plans, i think the below badly done photoshop is along the lines of where I’d like to head. That said knowing how i do things, i very likely will change my mind along the way. We will have to see at the next update………..
A few days ago Mr. Nobuichi Urushibata passed away.
I met Mr. Urushibata back in 2007 when I first came to his nursery to study. I arrived in Japan with little to no language and managed to negotiate myself to Taisho-en.
My first interaction with Oyakata (A word that means something along the lines of teacher, mentor, guardian in Japanese) was a chat where he warned me in broken english with a stern face that my time at the nursery would not be a holiday and I would need to be “like samurai”. He maintained the stern face for a few moments then broke out in laughter.
From that point forward I learned about how kind, caring and passionate he was. Over many visits and much time he guided me through my bonsai learning and provided me with much life advice.
At a base level I was always blown away with his child like enthusiasm for bonsai, whether that was finding new trees and stock, styling or just generally carrying out maintenance. He always carried out his teaching with a smile and could see the humorous side of things when they went wrong.
I would see him out in the garden in the early morning, just walking around looking at trees before others arrived to begin work. I never got the sense that he was working a job but rather following a passion and it was inspiring to watch.
I feel very lucky to have met him and spent time learning under his guidance. I owe so much to him from what I have learnt and I feel that he played a large role in shaping me into the person I am today.
I will miss him a lot but I carry with me many fond memories of our time together.
Rest in peace Oyakata.
I have been doing a lot of thinking about bonsai lately. What it is, why we do it and how it relates to modern lives outside of a Japanese context.
While discussing this with my good friend Natasha Morgan, she invited me to run a couple of bonsai workshops of a different kind at her beautiful property, Oak and Monkey Puzzle in Spargo Creek near Daylesford to begin a wider discussion.
One of the trees at Oak and Monkey Puzzle
The day long workshops will be aimed at teaching people to see and interpret the world through bonsai as an artistic medium rather than via a set of rigid rules. It will guide you through the process of reflecting on how we see the world, how we might become comfortable within this and how we might communicate this to others; An awakening through bonsai if you like which can and will be applied widely outside of bonsai.
Recently featured in Country Style magazine, her property, skirted by forest, will provide the perfect backdrop for learning and sharing ideas.
Another highlight of collaborating with Natasha is that the workshop will be teamed up with a beautiful 2 course kitchen garden lunch cooked from locally sourced, grown and foraged ingredients set in her stunning garden. Natasha is an incredibly passionate, talented and welcoming host who is sure to make the day a very special one.
Further details can be found at her site: http://www.natashamorgan.com.au/
Be sure to have a look over what else she has been up to while you are there as she is passionate about people, collaboration, food and sharing ideas and skills and brings these all together in such a beautiful way.
I Just wanted to say that my thoughts are with the people of Japan tonight in the wake of this terrible disaster.
To all my friends in Japan, i hope you, your famlies and friends are all safe.
Nichigo Bonsai 