New start for a shohin juniper

This is a story of a shohin juniper with a lot of changes in its life as bonsai. It was originally imported from Japan in 2003, and it was trained into a fine shohin specimen by Jos Vandeborne until 2009, when he decided to stop with doing bonsai. Jos always made pictures of the evolution of his trees, and now I can show its history from 2003 until now…

The juniper after being imported from Japan in the winter of 2002 – 2003, standing in a fine looking pot by Bigei…



In february 2006 it looked like this:



But in april 2006 Jos decided to restyle the tree with some help from Hotsumi Terakawa. A new front was chosen…



After he repotted it in the same Bigei pot in its new postion, it looked like this:



A year later it was an eye-catcher on a local bonsai exhibition:



But is was getting out of balance, and in may 2007 Jos decided to remove the lowest branch…



He repotted the juniper once more in the spring of 2008, but there were no major changes. And at the end of 2009 the tree came into my possesion after he decided to stop with bonsai. I must say it never has grown very well at my place for some reason. I never really could control this tree, the foliage grew more and further away from the trunk. Last year (April 2010) I decided to repot the tree because the roots were already pushing it out of the pot again…



After repotting it, it looked like this:



It gradually went better with this tree. But despite I think it was a very nice and good combination with the tree and pot, I decided to take this juniper on a different path. I found a nice Ibigawa rock at Bonsai Stdui Momiji, and after some thought about it, I decided to plant this juniper on this Ibigawa rock. This meant that there was another major surgery on it, only less than a year after the previous repotting, but it did go quite smoothly without any significant problems. I glued some wires to the rock with a 2-component adhesive so I could firmly anchor the tree to the rock. The soil mixture I used was keto, fine Kiryu and Akadama. After this operation, the tree looked like this:







Of course this was a complete change in the life of this tree. But a good half year later I finally felt that the tree was starting to grow good again on the rock. There was some new growth, I think the color of the foliage is now again a bit brighter, and the roots have grown very well too, especially on the spots where there were fertilzer baskets fixed on the soil. (see last detail picture)















Next spring I hope to wire the tree again and reshape it a bit. Like I said I never had control of the tree in the small Bigei pot. But the tree has finally had some new growth this year, and even some backwards budding. I hope this will continue in the good direction next year. I think the keto into the soil mixture had a positive influence on the health of the tree. At least I have the impression that it moves again forward instead of backwards. The Ibigawa rock does have some minor defects, such as the flat surface that you see in the last picture above. I hope to mask this by a low growing accent plant or some moss on it. And with such a rock planting I also will need a suitable suiban, so I will keep my eyes open for a nice one in the coming months.

Of course I don’t know whether you think this is a positive change in its history, but it was certainly another major one. I probably can no longer place this tree in the shohin category, but that doesn't really matter to me. I hope this tree will grow strong again, and if it does, I am pretty sure that it will become something ‘special’ on this rock. Now, I’m a bit curious to hear all your opinions about this change. So please don’t hesitate to give comments, positive or negative!

Kind regards,
Hans

Hi Hans

I think the tree have become much better, after being placed on the rock....The poor neabari is now not in mye eye anymore.
As a stone-person, do I really like the flat part of the stone. I would keep it like this.
How will you keep the green close to the trunk.?

Kind regards Yvonne

the tree suits the rock more than the pot, very nice story of the tree in pictures

to stop the foliage growing away from the trunk and the inside of the tree becoming bare lots of pinching of all the growth tips is needed throughout the growing season. this will make the foliage very thick and dense rather than long and thin. then the dense branches can be thinned out with scissors to let in light and you get lots of back buds. once they open properly the outer branches can be cut back to the new inner growth and the image remains nice and tight.

these juniper branches are always evolving so every few years the outer parts are cut back and new inner branches trained in their place - this keeps the tree fresh and strong not hollow and empty looking.

very nice tree, once the pads are wired and placed it will be a very natural scene

best regards Marcus

Have you considered layering? to me, the trunk becomes interesting at this point. I also think the foliage is too heavy for the thin trunk. Just some thoughts.

Yvonne Graubaek wrote:How will you keep the green close to the trunk?

Hi Yvonne, if the tree becomes healthy enough I think it is possible to get it backbudding closer to the trunk. Good care like Marcuss mentioned and a good fertilization program will be the key to success...

peter keane wrote:Have you considered layering?

Hi Peter, I never considered airlayering. I think the swirling trunk was one of the positive points on this tree, so shortening it never was on my mind. The nebari was poor, but with this kind of tree it wasn't a big problem. As you said, the foliage was maybe to heavy for the trunk. I think thinning out the foliage would have been a better solution...

Hello Hans
Great transformation the tree and rock work very well together.I agree about having maybe an accent plant or moss on the flat part of the rock just to add to the natural feeling that this portrays.

Awesome progression and a fantastic little tree!