I'm fairly new to bonsai and looking to understand the process from growing trees from seeds to pre-bonsai and on to bonsai plus whatever I am missing in those steps. I'm fairly visual, so a chart or infographic would be awesome, but I'd love to see the information in any form.
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Where can I see an explanation or illustration of the bonsai lifecycle from seed to death?
Where can I see an explanation or illustration of the bonsai lifecycle from seed to death?
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Duncan,
I don't know of such an illustration or guide. Depending on the source of the plant, the steps that need to be taken to create a bonsai (i.e., the bonsai life or development cycle) vary. Many bonsai books and magazines discuss (and illustrate) how to create a bonsai from seed (rare), from nursery stock, field material specially grown for bonsai, cuttings, and collected trees. The process can be quite different different for plants from different sources.
For example, if you are creating a bonsai from seed, one goal is to cut of the taproot of seedlings to encourage nice, radially arranged, surface roots. Another goal for seedlings is to thicken the trunk as much as possible (lots of fertilizer and a good balance of water and oxygen).
For nursery stock a goal is often to create or accentuate interesting movement in the trunk in and primary branches, often with heavy gage wire (structural wiring). Another important step in developing nursery stock is often to prune unnecessary branches and foliage to reveal the tree within the bush. Usually nursery stock also needs to be repotted into a shallower bonsai container.
For collected material, the first step is to ensure the root system recovers from collecting and develops well in a bonsai-sized container. Often collected trees also need to be pruned back (once the root system is healthy) to reveal the best characteristics of the tree.
At some point, a seedling, nursery plant, field grown plant, cutting and collected tree will move beyond those "development" phases/goals into "refinement." That often involves increasing fine branching (ramification) through pinching and wiring those secondary and tertiary branches into artistic and photosynthetically efficient locations. Reducing leaf or needle size through defoliation and other techniques is often another goal for trees in refinement.
The kicker is that once you have developed and refined your tree into a beautiful bonsai for display it continues growing and gets overgrown and bushy; then you return to the refinement (and maybe even development) process again. So, it truly is a cycle, not a one-way process from start through development to a final refined bonsai.
I just checked my copy of "Principles of Bonsai Design" by David DeGroot. He has chapters on "Selecting Plant Material" "Initial Design," and "Refinement." He shows nice examples (photos and drawings) of trees in each chapter. It is a really nice book but I know other materials (books and magazines) have similar content.
Maybe there is a comprehensive chart of infographic of the bonsai life cycle (I like your choice of words) but it would have to be very complex and (and ramified!).
Hope this is at least a little helpful,
Mike
Another good book is Modern Bonsai Practice by Larry Morton. It covers a variety of topics and common questions about all phases of bonsai.
I enjoy starting trees from seed and do it every year. But I recommend that you also acquire a few pre-bonsai to work with. It can take 2 or more years before something started form seed is ready to work on. I have a crab apple I started from a seed that is 10 years old and still pre-bonsai. I just started working it 3 years ago.
I don't want to discourage you. But, you will get the opportunity to work on trees right away if you purchase nursery stock or a pre-bonsai from a vendor. That is also where the fun is. So do both.
You can buy seeds online. I would stay away from 'bonsai seeds' on places like amazon and etsy. Bonsai seeds are just tree seeds available from many commercial growers. Finding those that sell retail is a bit more difficult.
Additional ways to start from seeds or seedlings? This spring look around to see if any are sprouting. I have a maple in my yard that produces lots of seeds every year and some germinate and sprout. Dig a few of those up. Next fall collect seeds from different trees. The crab I mentioned is from a tree across the street in a neighbors yard.
Welcome and stay tuned to the website forum and blog and the monthly meetings. Eventually when we restart the in person meetings there will be opportunities to acquire trees at the meetings.