I’ve been waiting three years to start shaping one of the junipers in my garden. Since I decided to graft it in winter, 2018, I’ve been allowing it to grow freely until there was enough new foliage to support the tree on its own (see “Grafting follow-up” for the previous post about this tree). I […]
Shimpaku
Bonsai Development Series #24: Twisting young junipers
The best strategy for creating junipers with interesting deadwood is to add twists to the trunk while the tree is still young. Some people begin by twisting young whips before they add movement. The alternative is to twist the trunk while setting the initial bends. Here’s what this looks like on a rooted cutting that […]
Bonsai Development Series #23: Wiring young juniper trunks
For years I’ve wanted to write about wiring rooted juniper cuttings, but I stopped short as before and after photos aren’t always helpful. Rooted juniper cuttings before and after wiring To make the trunk-line easier to see, I removed the foliage from a branch to use as an example. Wired juniper branch – 18″ From […]
A good reason to not skip annual maintenance on juniper bonsai
About a year ago, I passed a juniper in my garden that had filled in over the previous growing season. It was a good time to remove the old foliage, so I made a mental note to thin the tree. A full year later, I still hadn’t thinned the foliage. And then I noticed that […]
Carving tips for beginners
A member of the Bonsai Society of San Francisco, Samuel Tan, has taken an interest in juniper bonsai – especially deadwood work. Although relatively new to bonsai, Sam has picked up good tips from books like François Jeker’s Bonsai Deadwood and Cheng Cheng-Kung’s Bonsai Shari SiDiao. I was curious what information Sam had found most […]