Philippines Ficus species (This has EVOLVED into new Pemphis Acidula Design ideas, my apologies)

Does anyone have any knowledge they can share on a species of ficus found in the philippines local name red balete, i acquired one about a month ago and like all ficus it grows fast.  The leaves reduce very well and all new growth comes out red.  This looks quite nice and can be used for display purposes by leaf pruning a couple weeks before a show and by the time the "red balete is displayed it is popping with all red little leaves.

Thats the "red balete", the guy i acquired this tree from also has a large ficus thats similar to the red balete but instead of only new growth being red this ficus' leaves stay red considerably longer which i know to be true because i have observed this tree in this garden for a few months.  The trunk is a grey color with black dots(dormant buds).  The leaves are a bit big but last i saw it was about a week after pruning and the new leaves were coming in much smaller but im just not sure if it stays small.  He says this is a much rarer version of the red balete called the "SUPER RED".  Clearly not the scientific name or even a common name so im posting to see if anyone, specially in the Philippines can share any knowledge on these 2 ficus.  I will be acquiring this tree tomorow unless i get any bad replys about the (for lack of a better name) "super red"(ficus).

heres the "super red" aprox 1wk after defoliating.


heres the red balete before i got to work on it


i just wanted to throw this in, the rest will go in progression eventually, this trees roots were just wrapped around a circle around the pot and that is how the  nebari looks... im fixing that as much as i can each re pot.  1st re pot i cut the nebari in the back at an angle that towards the soil.  after a couple days it looked like it had a ring of yellow goo coming out of it.  i covered it in spagnum and a couple days later this is how it looked.

im not sure how to make the first pic bigger. its ok i went back to buy it since last seeing with small new leaves after defoliating and all the leaves were very large once again so instead of getting the "super red" ficus i got this Pemphis, my 5th pemphis and im very happy with this one.



i had another design in mind but the main branch i would have needed was slightly snapped in 2 different spots (aparently from past bending attempts), i wrapped it up best i could and bent in areas away from the damage. made up my mind to go with a slanting design with a tight umbrella and left myself some nice deadwood above the crown which will be carved once my power tools arrive.

was at this earlier but the rain just wouldnt stop, it will be done in the morning, the top foliage will be removed and the right foliage will be thinned out


lower deadwood/nebari

J,

Red ficus won't stay red leaf for more than a month.

The Phempis looks great.

regards,
jun  

yea i realized just new growth, can still be taken advantage of for display prep. That other kind of red ficus the first pic i have without a doubt does stay red atleast 4 times longer but i concluded that the leaves dont reduce well... the tree i have pictured is rather big so it can get away with it but still too big for my taste. I do really like the "red balete" and see a good future for my small tree that i have, once the nebari is aranged and the first branch is improved. i love the leaves, they reduce very well, and the tint of red or orange on the trunk to me looks very unique compared to other ficus from my limited experience.

as far as the pemphis goes, your quick four words means alot to me... honostly im only about 5-6months in and other than the guy i buy these from (who has good material and is a great guy but lacks hhmm a light artistic touch...) only neighbors see my work and they say nice but im pretty sure ive freaked them all out with how much time i spend on my trees hahaha. that and the occasional tricycle drivers that stand by outside my gate who i pay 20pesos to help me moves some of my bigger trees. That is the first compliment from anyone who knows bonsai that ive recieved, add to that the level that you are at jun and your knowledge in our trees and climate here i could not think of anyone whos opinion would matter much more to me. So four quick words from you but to me, ill carry that one for some time to come...

ill eventually display some other pemphis but ill wait until i am happier with them I want to re-pot most of them (they were all collected 6 years ago and left alone). long twiggy branches that need to be fixed via master stevens techniques.

oh btw jun this pemphis is in a rediculously heavy cement pot with only 1 small drainage hole. i realized that the drainage hole is almost completely packed with pemphis roots. like i said these trees were collected a while ago and have sat almost untouched.

anyway i read in one of your older posts that rainy season is not a good time to work on pemphis, specially re-potting but it seems that my new pemphis may have a hard time waiting until summer to be re-potted. i am inclined to just go ahead with the re-pot because before i found this forum and all of your helpful advice, i re-potted my biggest pemphis (triple trunk) during rainy season. I re-potted it like i re-pot a ficus haha. I removed it from the pot by loosening the soil around the pot, worked out a little soil then i pulled the huge tree up and out of the soil (it wasnt until after i inspected the old soil when i was done that i realized how many roots were left behind when i pulled the tree out). I removed all the soil combing out with chop sticks, i even root pruned all the long roots. Then i worked in my new soil with chopsticks(rather roughly as i recall). placed the tree under a roof to protect from heavy rain, but he still recieved a good 1-2hours of evening sun. A day or two later i found this forum and all this info and realized i did EVERYTHING wrong as far as pemphis re-potting. all the leaves changed color and looked thin and bit dried out... but after a couple weeks and alot of attention and rooting hormone/plant reviver the tree gained its color and vigour back completely, and only about 2-3 small branches died back which i blame on clumsy wiring. Now my triple trunk is back at 110%... i think it might be safe to re pot my new pemphis with all my newly gained knowledge. ill retain most the soil at the rootball and no root pruning unless 100% neccisary to fit in a pot. How would you handle this? go through with the emergency re-pot despite rainy season? or hold off as long as possible for summer? any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated... thank you and good day.

J.,

Don't gamble with your trees.

I made an sketch for your phempis. I'll post it later.

regards,
jun:) 

my trees are priceless to me, what seems like a careless gamble to someone with your experience is simply me gaining mine. In other words i would never risk my trees just to get it in a pretty new pot. Advice from the likes of you are equally important to me, advice i can trust. unfortunately for months i found very little information on care for pemphis and strangely the 1 or 2 sites or articles i ran into mentioned re-potting for pemphis should be carried out during rainy season. As all of my pemphis come from just one guy who had them collected 6 years ago, they all need to be re-potted as soon as possible. Everything i do to my trees are for their further development and well being but never at the risk of loosing them. IBC is priceless, it brings begginers and masters into the same conversation, what is random banter to you in a certain topic is often information someone like me has spent countless hours researching to find out and that latest question has now influenced me for likely the rest of my bonsai journey to keep in mind, re potting a pemphis in the rainy season is riskier than keeping it root bound an partly clogged until summer.

also ive realized the importance of drawing your future vision on paper or digitally, my sketch book is filling up fast, eventually i hope to post progressions of my trees starting out with a pic of how it arrived to my garden followed by a sketch and so on. though it seems my latest bantigue the sketch that follows the material may well have your signature in the corner instead of mine hahha. your sketch for my material would be apreciated to no end sir jun thank you.

here is what i was aiming for. This material provides alot of options, i went with this because i didnt have to remove too many developed branches which leaves me just as many options in the future when ive developed my vision a bit more

J,

As promised:





regards,
jun  

what kind of trees can be made as bonsai in philippines ?

ejay08 wrote:what kind of trees can be made as bonsai in philippines ?

Sent you a reply at the Lounge section.

regards,
jun