Month: March 2010

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Bonsai Pots

Bonsai Pots and Containers – Just as Essential as Our Bonsai Trees

Bonsai-tree-Carmona

A bonsai is a tree in pot. Hence, the bonsai pot that we choose for our bonsai tree is an integral and vital part of the entire bonsai composition. Without a well-matching bonsai pot, the bonsai is incomplete. The bonsai pot is not just a container in which we grow our bonsai tree. It is also the most important element that must match well with our bonsai tree so that the final composition integrates well as a complementary unit.

Most bonsai pots are made of stoneware, ceramic, terracotta, mica, or plastic. Some bonsai pots are collector items in themselves, being hundreds of years old and worth thousands of dollars. But even put aside these antiques, bonsai pots are still fairly expensive.

Having all these said, we should keep in mind that the bonsai pot is no more and no less than an essential complementary unit of our bonsai tree. Our bonsai tree is always the lead character, while its bonsai pot is the number one sidekick who can brighten up and emphasize the beauty of the bonsai tree.

Here are a few more articles on how to choose bonsai pots for our bonsai trees.
What Bonsai Pots for What Bonsai Trees?
Bonsai Pot – Get the Right Size for Our Tree
Bonsai Pots for Different Bonsai Styles
Bonsai Pots of Different Materials
Bonsai Pots of Different Shapes and Sizes
Is Your Bonsai Tree Ready for a Bonsai Pot?
Choosing Your Bonsai Pots

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Bonsai Pots Featured Articles

Is Your Bonsai Tree Ready for a Bonsai Pot?

Bonsai-tree-potBefore a bonsai tree is potted into its final bonsai pot, it first should be potted in a training pot, where there are more space and resources for the bonsai tree to grow and develop its root system and new branches.  During this period, ramification and final branch placement will begin.

When we get a new bonsai tree, if it is a juvenile bonsai tree that is still growing quite rapidly, we should use bonsai training pots before we decide on a final show pot to exhibit our bonsai tree.   While old bonsai trees, which do not need to be trained anymore and have been repotted and root-pruned many times already, are adapted to living in small bonsai pots, young bonsai trees need much more room to grow.  Young bonsai trees need to be trained step-by-step to adept to living in smaller pots, by pruning their roots every time they are being repotted.  These young bonsai trees can be potted in less expensive bonsai pots or in plastic containers which are widely available at many online bonsai supply shops.

When we repot our bonsai tree from the bonsai training pot to its final bonsai pot, the shape of the bonsai tree should already been decided and formed.  Most of the shaping and forming should have been done by this time.  During the training phase, a lot of work is going on.  The bonsai training pots are like a workhouse of the bonsai pot.  Most of the shaping and pruning, as well as wiring and rewiring, are done when the bonsai tree is potted in the training pot.

Therefore, bonsai training pots need not to be beautiful works of art.  All they need to be is sturdy and light in weight.  When the bonsai tree is ready to be repotted from the bonsai training pot, we can start looking at aesthetics, and search for the perfect bonsai pot to showcase our beautiful bonsai tree.  And this is when colors and designs of bonsai pots become important.

Here are a few more articles on how to choose bonsai pots for our bonsai trees.
What Bonsai Pots for What Bonsai Trees?
Bonsai Pot – Get the Right Size for Our Tree
Bonsai Pots for Different Bonsai Styles
Bonsai Pots of Different Materials
Bonsai Pots of Different Shapes and Sizes
Choosing Your Bonsai Pots

Categories
Bonsai How To

Watering Our Mini Bonsai Trees

Mame-Shohin-Bonsai

Watering bonsai trees as small as shohin bonsai or mame bonsai can be a challenging task. We can easily overwater our bonsai trees, as well as underwater them. Because the bonsai pot sizes are so small, it often becomes difficult to gauge the exact amount of water required by these bonsai trees. In places of dry climate, mini bonsai trees should be watered as much as three times daily, if not more on some hot summer days, since the two or three tablespoons of soil can dry out very quickly. Just like our normal-size bonsai trees, the water requirement depends on the temperature, humidity, and air current.

To create a moist atmosphere for our mini bonsai trees, we can keep the bonsai pot buried in damp sand. This will help our bonsai trees from completely lacking of water. Another easy way to water our mini bonsai trees is to immerse our bonsai trees in water until no more air bubble rises to the top.

In addition, all foliage of our min bonsai trees should be sprayed daily. When we first have our mini bonsai tree potted, we should place our mini bonsai tree somewhere in the shade for about a week. After that, we can introduce our mini bonsai tree to the sun. Mini bonsai can be placed both indoors as well as outdoors. But we should never keep these mini bonsai trees in a confined and shaded location. Mame bonsai and shohin bonsai needs sunlight to grow properly just like normal bonsai do.

The location we choose for our mini bonsai tree is the same as for normal bonsai tree and the instructions regarding the care and cultivation are no different as well.

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Bonsai How To

Finding Trees for Mini Bonsai

Mame-Shohin-Bonsai

We can obtain mini bonsai by collecting trees from the wild, by growing them from off-shoots, by cultivating them from seeds and cuttings, or by buying them from bonsai nurseries.

Mame bonsai trees and shohin bonsai trees need to be grown for between three and five years to shape the tree sufficiently to be called as bonsai. We can start with seedlings of 3-5 cm tall. These seedlings can be found in woods and parks at the foot of some large trees, and many of these little off-shoots are already in an interesting shape at this early stage. Nevertheless, mini bonsai should be miniature versions of the original tree in the nature, but not some weird looking, deformed trees.

When we go to the mountainous areas to collect trees for our mini bonsai, we should take shovels, picks, newspaper to wrap our collection in and rope to secure the soil until we get home. We want to make sure the tree that we bring home is kept fresh in the best condition it can be.Mame-Shohin-Bonsai

Our local nursery is another place where we can find good shohin potentials. We do not need to start off with anything expensive or fancy. What we are looking for is a tree that has potential for shohin bonsai. It must be well balanced a miniature in size, or at least, capable of being trained miniature. We may not find what we want right away, but take several trips to different nurseries. With some patience and luck, we may find some excellent potential of mini bonsai tree at our nursery.

As for starting time, spring is the best time of the year to go looking for suitable bonsai tree material. We should dig the little tree out carefully without damaging the roots. We then remove the taproot, leave some earth on the roots, and wrap the plant in damp moss or moistened newspaper to avoid the mini bonsai tree from drying out.