Mahogany Row Studio

Medium Trees

Posted by Rob Kempinski on Jan 09 2007

If its not shohin and its not large then it must be a medium size tree. Probably the most popular type of tree, medium trees find a place in many collections, mine included. Here are a few of them:
Left alone, a Buttonwood, Conocarpus erectus, will grow ramrod straight. However, sometime in this buttonwood’s life perhaps a hurricane ripped it from its roots, or an alligator sat on it. Either way, it grew anything but straight developing a beautiful thick but flat shari and a thin curling solitary live vein – perfect for a bonsai. Upon collection, this tree had none of the current branches nor an apex.

In 7 years, with purposeful pruning, fertilizing, wiring, and defoliating the branches grew to make a traditionally styled slanting silhouette with small leaves.

The tree is about 24 inches tall. Careful carving accentuated the grain and features of the driftwood. While it is not possible to say exactly, the size of the wood, the number of rings and the previous rot indicate this tree is old, perhaps circa 1925.

This tree’s name is “Tsunami” due to a portion of the driftwood, shown on the left, that looks like a breaking tidal wave.

The pot is a high quality unglazed Japanese pot imported 24 years ago. The dark color complements the bleached shari and evergreen leaves. It is now in a different pot.

Chinese yew, Podocarpus, are common landscape plants in Florida. This one was collected from a hedge and reduced significantly. It has great taper and is developing well. The first two branches on the right grew from buds after collecting. Circa 1988. 25 inches tall. Chinese pot.

This is the Podocarpus in June 2008.

This is a semiformal upright Japanese Black Pine. Its about 24 inches tall. Its in a Chinese pot.

Black Olive, Bucida Spinosa, come from the Bahamas. Collected specimens are rare, but are seed grown samples are available at bonsai nurseries, as was this one. It is from seed, circa 1995. 20 inches tall. Hand made USA pot by Tom Demig.

Inspired by Wilma
During Hurricane Wilma the bending trees gave me an idea for a bonsai style. I converted this collected potential informal upright Florida Elm into a hurricane blowing style. I also took the opportunity to hollow the trunk to create more patina.

Mike Pollack gave me an idea for this tree on the IBC. When I repotted it, I took his advice and carved some notches into the chop site. It helps break up the straight section near the chop. Thanks Mike. The pot is Chinese of decent quality.

The tree needs a season or two to develop a bit more ramification. This style requires frequent wiring and wire removal. Very labor intensive.

Leaves are starting to arrive.

The little twig on the bottom left is the upper end of a cutting used as a root graft to try to improve the nebari at the rear of the tree.

Who knows what bonsai lurks in the heart of a tree?….The Shadow does.

Here is the Shadow, a Juniper parsonii (Junipersus chineseis parsonii) collected from a coworkers front yard about 5 years ago. (Urban yamadori). From pot edge to tip is 24 inches and the jin stands about 13.5 inches above the pot rim.

Peter Evans graciously sent me a virtual design of the tree without the top jin. He recommends pruning it and showing it as a shohin even though the live portion is 24 inches but much shorter top to bottom (in the new virtual design). Here is his virtual with the background cleaned up by me.

July 2008 – I am saddened to report that the crew that cuts my grass knocked the Shadow off its pedestal and broke the top – then didn’t tell me. By the time I noticed the top was broken the tree had died. There probably wasn’t much I could have done as the top had pretty much cracked off the dead wood and the cambium was severed. RIP.

A Juniper of unknown variety. Collected in 1999 from a school bus parking area. I think the school buses regularly backed into it hence the shari on the trunk. The foliage is least suitable for bonsai. It makes very little scale foliage – mostly needles and doesn’t like to be pinched. Nonetheless, I work on it every so often. I am gradually reducing the foliage on the tree. Here it is after its most recent work.

In person the pads are very distinctly layered. The photo doesn’t do that justice. Every little shoot is wired. That took about 8 hours of work over a couple of days. My daughter says it now looks anorexic which I guess is good for a bunjin style. The pot is a nanban style by Jim Gremel of California.

Here are some older shots of the tree. Here it was at the EPCOT Flower and Garden show in 2002.

Later on that year it filled out. As it looked in August 2002.

It’s January and the Chinese Elm buds are popping so its time to repot them here in Melbourne, Fl.

This is a before shot of the elm. Note the mound of soil under the tree. It was repotted last year but I didn’t reduce the root ball as much as I would have liked. I will do it this time.

Here it is after the repot. The mound is gone and the nebari looks better with a very slight change to the front. The pot is by Nick Lenz of Massachusetts.