20 and Under

This coming Sept in Rochester, NY, Bill Valvanis will be hosting a shohin bonsai convention at his annual symposium. This is quite exciting! I was part of the original American Shohin Bonsai Society that never got off the ground and it was one of our main goals to have a bi-annual shohin bonsai convention to alternate with the Shohin Bonsai convention in California. When the ASBS floundered, Bill stepped in with his symposium – wonderful! I hope many of you will be going to this as Bill always puts on a first rate convention at an affordable price. I have been grooming some trees for the exhibit since the spring. Sometimes you don’t always get what you hoped for and some trees have not behaved as expected so I have to use others. To wet your appetite, this picture is of a bonsai shop outside of Tokyo – every supply imaginable!

Early summer is an important time for shohin bonsai work. Black pines are decandled at this time. Deciduous trees are also defoliated. This is an important task for the shohin bonsai grower. With the ‘less is more’ motto, it creates the challenge of keeping what little foliage we have to be compact and with very fine ramification. By defoliating healthy trees, we accomplish a few things: a) allow light into the inner portions of the tree to create some new budding; b) reduce the leaf size of the tree (which is also critical for a smaller sized bonsai) and, c) it allows for a mid-season evaluation of the growth of the tree. Once the leaves are off, you can see where some cutback can be done and even some light wiring can be done at this point. Here in zone 6 B in southern Rhode Island, I use July 4th as my goal for defoliating. I generally defoliate my tridents quite aggressively as they are such strong growers. I also defoliate japanese maples but to a bit lesser degree. I defoliate zelkova and ficus salicaria (the only ficus I work with). I have had buttonwoods and defoliate them later in July/Aug when they finally become relatively happy here in New England. After defoliation, I usually back off on fertilization and also do not over water (as the trees need to push foliage out before they can use it). Also, keep them under shade cloth until buds begin to show. There are certainly no prohibitions to this nude sunbathing among bonsai – as plants don’t have the physical shyness nor moral restrictions about their ‘bodies’ that we have

No, it’s not a flashback to a ’60’s drug inspired fantasy I’ll try to stay on (and off topic) regarding Shohin bonsai. The title ‘20 and under’ refers to my feeling that shohin bonsai are those under 20 cm tall. I was a bit surprised when staying at Taisho en in Shizuoka Japan that one of the Japanese Shohin bonsai Associations allows up to 25 cm. Seems a bit big to me. Mr. Urushibata said that some of the old and valuable shohin in Japan just got too big for the ‘20 and under’ classification so the powers that be increased the size limit (to keep them more valuable? There’s that pesky bonsai politics again!) Anyway, to my taste, 20 cm seems the more appropriate limit. Hope you enjoy.