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A Bonsai Restyle
By Thomas J.
One of the most fun things about bonsai to me, is
to do a restyle on a tree that seems to have no hope
or future. To give it new life, by changing its appearence,
is as about as exciting as it gets in the art of bonsai.
Many people will just throw in the towel and say the
heck with this one. What I would like you to do from
this article, is to look over some of your trees that
you lost interest in, and see if you can do something
special to any of them by reconsidering a new restyle
on them. You may find something special in some of
them as I did in this one, and it may become one of
your favorite trees for that reason.
The format on
this article will be a little different than I usually
do. I won't be doing the talking here, instead my specimen
will be, in sort of a non-fiction type story. I hope
you like it, and I hope it will inspire you to do at
least one restyle.
From Whence We Came
A bonsai restyle
Hi,
We're what's known as a Japanese Nire Elm group.
We began our humble life together back somewhere in
California many many moons ago. Sometime around 1990
or 1991 we were shipped off to Texas to be sold as
a bonsai forest at this lonely garden center nursery.
I guess you could say we were taken pretty good care
of there. I mean check out that mound of moss we had
going there to keep our feet cool. People couldn't
believe that it was real, and oh how they loved to
touch it. Yes those were the good old days boy, but
life goes on, and we were finally sold to this guy
who was just starting his new found joy in life with
bonsai.
I guess you could say by judging from this picture
taken about nine years later, that we were well taken
care of, and maybe that's an under statement. He made
sure we were well fed and our thirsts really quenched
from that blazing Texas heat. We were pretty much content
most of the time, but there were also times when we got
pretty frustrated because of the way we looked. I mean
come on, nine years into this and he aint got a plan
yet?
Needless to say we felt a little top heavy at times.
We sure liked it when Fall and Winter finally got
here so we could finally shed some of that weight off,
but my god, look it how ragged out we looked. Even though
we were well taken care of, we felt neglected. As his
collection grew and his interests in other species along
with his advancements in his styling, we were literally
pushed aside. Why couldn't he try something new on us?
Finally one day after noticing us just sitting
on the ground away from the rest of the trees that were
on nice benches, he decided to do something with us.
He looked inside through the mass of foliage we had at
the time, and saw that a good portion of our inside was
filled with dieback and scale.
He finally admitted to
himself that he just about blew it with us. Without having
a plan, he just started cutting and chopping away at
us. I guess he realized that he would have to bite the
bullet on all those years of growing us, and start over.
He did have one thing going for him though,
he does know how to do a restyle with almost miracelous
results. We were confident that when he was through with
us, that even we wouldn't recognize ourselves, and that
we too would find a place on one of his benches along
with his other fine specimens.
Well what do you think?
I told you we wouldn't look the same. This was taken
after our first wiring and shaping, and repotting into
a new Tokoname pot.
Here's another shot of us
as we're loving our new look.
For some reason he just won't leave us alone
now. He's constantly trimming and nipping new buds where
they don't belong. I think we've become one of his favorites
now rather than the old neglected forest that we used
to be.
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