The term decandling gets a lot of attention. Rightly so – it’s a key technique in the development of black and red pine bonsai. It’s the technique that helped me get from here: June, 2013 to here: June, 2016 in three years. By itself, however, the technique is fairly limited. Cutback and needle-pulling are equally […]
Black Pine
How vigorous are your pines?
We all know the basic signs that are our pines are healthy – dark green foliage and long spring shoots. Green growth on a 12 year-old pine Vigorous spring shoot There’s another clear sign that pines are healthy that may not be as obvious. At first glance, the pine below looks like you would expect […]
It’s time to feed pines
One of the best ways to ensure decandled pines produce strong summer growth is to feed heavily in spring. Although people living in cooler climates are just wrapping up repotting season, others have been feeding their pines for several months. If you haven’t started feeding yet – and you live in the northern hemisphere – […]
Black pine from landscape material – follow-up
I recently received a request – thanks Chris – for an update about a landscape pine on its way to becoming a bonsai. Here’s what the tree looked like in 2012. January, 2012 (see Part 1 and Part 2 for the rest of the story) After removing the top half of the tree and repotting, […]
Pot selection follow-up
Thanks to all who attended this past weekend’s Bay Island Bonsai exhibit. It was a fun event and I’ll have plenty to share about starting this Friday. Today I wanted to revisit last week’s pot selection exercise. I really appreciate all of the suggestions and wanted to respond before getting to the rest of the […]