Last weekend the San Diego Bonsai Club held their 60th anniversary celebration. The event was held at the San Diego Zoo’s Safari Park, home to the Bonsai Pavilion, a beautiful garden and bonsai collection built and maintained by volunteers in the club.
If you have a chance to visit, I highly recommend it! The team that maintains the trees does a great job of demonstrating how well diverse species can grow in the foothills northeast of San Diego. This is in large part thanks to Curator John Jackson (who led the construction of the Pavilion), Assistant Curator Dennis Wagner, Cathy and Mark Edgar, and the rest of the volunteers who come to learn and work on trees in the collection.
The Bonsai Pavilion
Curator John Jackson posing with an oriental sweet gum (that he started from scratch)
I’d expected to see species like olive, pomegranate, and California juniper that do well in warm climates, and the Pavilion had a good selection of each.
Giant pomegranate
California juniper
California juniper
Olive
What I didn’t expect was to see was a Japanese maple. The Pavilion uses an irrigation system to water the trees and shelters them with shade cloth. It’s a good combination that makes it possible to grow trees that don’t mind warm temps as long as they’re not in full sun.
Japanese maple
The rest of the collection was a mix of native species, including coast live oak, as well as exotic species such as bald cypress.
Coast live oak
Bald cypress
The bald cypress above was one of my favorite trees in the collection as it has great branch structure – the result of repeated pruning over a lot of years.
You can learn more about the Bonsai Pavilion at the San Diego Bonsai Club’s website or plan your visit by checking out the San Diego Zoo Safari Park website.
News & Updates
- We’re currently wrapping up production on the 2024 Pacific Bonsai Expo commemorative album with a plan to send it to the printer soon. Depending on their schedule, we hope to start shipping the book in 2-3 months. Our apologies for the delay!
- I’ve added additional trees to the sales page.
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Charlie Mosse says
Great photos. Members really liked your comments on the trees. Lots of people with rapt attention. Thank you!!
Glenn Pawl says
Thanks Jonas for the recap and great photos. I’m curious about one thing: for the Japanese maples, how do they handle the cold temperature requirements for Winter dormancy? I can’t imagine San Diego having too many 40 degree days at that time of year.
Jonas Dupuich says
I was curious about that too – apparently maples don’t need that much cold and/or the temps drop just enough in the foothills to keep maples healthy.
Zheng Zheng says
Hey Jonas! Escondido/San Pasqual Valley is in a Zone 9b/10a, which does get a few hundred chill hours each winter whereas coastal regions are closer to 10b/11a with less than 50 chill hours each winter (effectively none). The challenge for inland is the heat and dryness though so if those requirement can be met with misting and shade cloth, there’s definitely a good chance as demonstrated by that J maple at Safari Park.
Zheng Zheng says
https://fruitsandnuts.ucdavis.edu/chill-calculator
Look at the Escondido SPV station in SoCal. They got over 1000 chill hours this season! In contrast, look at Torrey Pines where they got next to nothing (coastal). Microclimates make a big difference here in San Diego County.
Winter temps don’t tell the whole story though and inland areas tend to have very dry and hot summers – but they seem to have managed the heat and dryness at the Safari Park.
Jonas Dupuich says
Thanks, Zeng – that’s a super useful resource!
Myron Chapple says
Great looking trees. Nice job fellas.