hmmmmm basic question.

OK, I seem to have stirred up what appears to be a perennial (see what I did there?
) debate about the first few years of development in the art, and should you spend money on decent material or cheap stuff to learn on blah blah blah.

Anyhoo, I have some bits I picked up from a chap I know which strikes me as bloody cheap and having potential, £25 and £30 respectively for hornbeam and chinese elm yamadori. pretty straight trunks, decent root structure and very healthy. Nowt dramatic. Good enough for me though. So, boffins and elder statesmen and experienced artistes that there are here, please define what 'good material' is. If anybody mentions personal taste and subjectivity I will thrash you.

bobby little wrote:So, boffins and elder statesmen and experienced artistes that there are here, please define what 'good material' is. If anybody mentions personal taste and subjectivity I will thrash you.

The politically correct approach: Start with your bonsai books, cruise the web and look at pictures (NO...of BONSAI!) Then when you have specific questions of particular specimens to view, post them here with a beginning idea of what you have.

My approach: Get what looks like it has potential to me, mess with it for a year, post it in the IBC and wait for everyone to tell me its not good bonsai material!
Then go back and keep working with it whle I search for more material (while continuing to read and cruise the internet for pictures (I told you NO! For Bonsai Pictures!

The voices in my head keep telling me "keep digging, there's a bonsai in there somewhere!"

I don't know how this translates for non-English speaking members, but here is my favorite poem (wrote it myselves):

The Schizophrenics poem:

Red are the roses,
Blue is the sky,
I'm a schizophrenic,



And so am I!

Everyone have a great weekend,

Jay

So long as you have selected trees with a good root spread and trunk flare at the base and a trunk shape that appeals to you, you are half way there. With Elm you can get away with a short and straight trunk to develop as a broom style, though they can make good informal uprights too. Carpinus betulus - Hornbeam is a slower grower and you may need to make use of some of the existing branch structure. Hopefully, if they have a little age to them, they may have bark developing.

Ideally we need to see them to say much more.

Kev Bailey wrote:So long as you have selected trees with a good root spread and trunk flare at the base and a trunk shape that appeals to you, you are half way there. With Elm you can get away with a short and straight trunk to develop as a broom style, though they can make good informal uprights too. Carpinus betulus - Hornbeam is a slower grower and you may need to make use of some of the existing branch structure. Hopefully, if they have a little age to them, they may have bark developing.

Ideally we need to see them to say much more.

I wasn't hassling people for opinions on my stuff, rather general principles on what is seen as quality material. thought I might provoke another debate ( ) and thereby have lots of different positions to learfrom ,machiavellian cad that I am.

Pictures, plain background, well lit, but avoid shadows. And be prepare to get asked for diffeent angles. Also, more than a few here are Photoshop gifted and can & will provide possibilities with pots, pruning, jin & shari.

Not being sarcastic here. Photos tell it all.

Jay

nah man. general principles, to stimulate debate, not my trees.

"keep digging, there's a bonsai in there somewhere!"

That's usually not true. We had an article on choosing material for bonsai, but it went with the old site.

But as Kev says, there are two things you MUST have:

• A good base (nebari, if you must), and
  
  A good lower trunk

.

"Straight" trunks don't often make anything but good telephone poles. How many beginner trees have y see here which were an inch thick at the base and still an inch thick two feet up. Those are not "good material" and are virtually impossible to make better.

If you have a good base and a good lower trunk (including some taper), you can build from there.

JimLewis wrote:

"keep digging, there's a bonsai in there somewhere!"

That's usually not true.

Sorry, Jim, I forgot your "humor" classification, "very little".

I am currently working on not listening to the voices. I have lots of maybe stuff, an increasing amount of good stuff, but I still have a few bad habits regarding what I think I like.

In time... I'm be dead, and my kids will throw all my trees away. Till then, I'm just trying to stay busy and keep my kids mom off my case! (The wife of 30 years.)

Jay

Bobby this is a huge question, best answered with examples. I am busy at the weekend and what with the failing evening light it could be a couple of days before i can take some pics. When I do I shall post them and try to explain why i chose to dig them up.

will baddeley wrote:Bobby this is a huge question, best answered with examples. I am busy at the weekend and what with the failing evening light it could be a couple of days before i can take some pics. When I do I shall post them and try to explain why i chose to dig them up.

I look forward to it.

Hi Bobby,

Don't take anything as personal from the aforementioned thread.

I'd say do your own thing and learn the ropes but also understand that although it is great to start from scratch, I prefer to let someone else do the hard yards for me these days.

One of my first purchases was this Acer Arakawa (rough bark) - £50 iirc- and after 4 years of on-line participation, advice and observation realised it was not very good at all, so chopped the you know what out of it and probably have another 5 years to go before it turns into something worthy of even the most humble club table show.



I now buy or collect stuff like this



What my newer trees all have in common is good trunk taper and nebari/root spread.

You also come to realise that if you're paying less than £100 for a tree it is probably only basic starter material and if in the £100-200 range it's merely better quality starter material like this larch necessitating a few steps back to go several forward.



Hope these examples help

TimR

they do. thanks. this is what I was looking for with the original post.

as for taking things personally - I work in psychiatry. my skin is thicker than Rhino hide. and there was nowt there to get upset by anyway.

how much did the purchased honeysuckle set you back?

Hi Bobby
(start of infomercial)
Technically I didn't buy it - I traded it with Harry Harrington (bonsai4me.com) for a biggish wild looking pinus sylvestris I picked up from an acquired collection at Dai Ichi Newbury and got an afternoon's bonsai intensive throw in!

I believe the pine was collected in the New Forest.

Harry had the Loni listed at about £125 iirc and I paid a tad less for the unstyled Pinus syl. Absolute bargain!!!! The loni was a garden rescue as was my 3rd from left above. The tree's less than 3 year design history is still on his website.

http://bonsai4me.com/AdvTech/ATlonicera.htm

I didn't have a clue what to do with the Pinus and rather than struggle with it jumped at the chance to trade it for a pro designed tree.

Harry turned the Pinus into a wonderful looking tree which he has now sold on.

The trees as traded are left and right and HH's transformation of the pinus is in the centre.


(end of infomercial )

Just like all painters don't become Velasquez, Constable's or Dali's nor do all ball players turn into Renaldo's or Jordan's I know that I -and many of us- are not going to become a world renowned bonsai designersI so am quite happy to trade or add pre-deigned bonsai to my collection.

But we need to strive to improve our skills and the material we work with to get real satisfaction from bonsai, and also be very selective number-wise with what we work with or disillutionment sets in and it becomes a waste of time and money.

Just my opinion of course.

Thks

timR

As promised a few pics of some trees i've decided I could not do without. First two and second two belonged to the same tree. My trade is thatching and whilst im about my duties' I occasionally come across a "little honey". This Elm belonged to a derelict hedge and only the top was visible above a heap of garden waste. I asked the customer if i could excavate and got permission. The tree was very long and had inverse taper but I had an idea and air layered it at a demo. The first two pics are the bit I did'nt want. Front and back.

This base has good barkand good taper could be achieved with clever carving.

Sorry about some of the picture quality, it was getting dark. English Elm has good bonsai potential as it buds on old wood, air layers easily[ I removed this from the base after six weeks] short internodes and rapid growth if needed

The back.

I find this very interesting, but I dont have any suggestions about it.
Trying not to say so much here, im very new at this, and I guess you have already seen the options im thinking of, and my decisions havent started to be so good yet.

Another option is to air layer again at the half way point, to make a very stout tree. Then i hae the top to play with as well.

Another Elm, also from a hedge and air layered. I counted the rings when I separated it and its over 80 . Good movement, bark etc.

The back. I hope for the base to flare a bit more as the new roots thicken.

You bored with Elms yet? Well tough! Heres another one. Secret location, where a farmer cuts a hedge to the ground every two years. I have better examples but I want to save them for another post.

Close up of deadwood