Cotoneaster bonsai & bare-rooting

Hi all

I have got myself a few Cotoneaster tree cuttings. They are many years from being developed, etc but I have found another specimen at the local nursery which I might well purchase and play with.

My question is about re-potting. A bit of research has told me that the tree should never be bare-rooted when re-potting. Admittedly, I am a newbie and when I re-pot, I tend to clear out all the soil from the roots, give them a good wash and trim as required. Until now, this has been giving me good results as the trees tend to recover well and have bloomed in most instances. However, I'm not entirely sure how one goes about root pruning / re-potting without bare-rooting the tree.

Any GOOD advice is welcome...

Odd. I have had no problems bare-rooting YOUNG cotoneasters. I bought a pot full of them (Yes, after bare rooting there were 7 in the pot) and I planted them individually. This was bare-rooting to the max. Planted in the growing beds and were pushing leaves within a week again. Eventually killed 6 of them in an early spring transplant, removing 80% of the roots and forgot to water them in a dry spell 2 weeks later. But the bare rooting itself.. tyhey never hesitated.

Maybe it is species specific?

Jelle.

Thanks for the reply Leatherback. It could well simply be broad-spectrum instructions that apply to all species of Cotoneasters.

It is trial and error after all so I'm inclined to bare-root and re-pot...however, I will note some other advice from the www in that I won't be reducing the root base by more than 30% for each re-pot.

With that said, I'm still intrigues how one re-pots without bare-rooting. I'm assuming it is simply a matter of reducing the root ball by the required amount without disrupting the soil and then re-plant the tree with the soil attached into new soil. It doesn't seem a very effective way to establish a good root base...?

It does depend on the species, but also how old it is and also how much it cost. If it was cheap then it is less of a risk. That said I do not bare root intentionaly any tree. Sometimes it happens because there is not a lot of roots, or if there are a number of plants in the pot. We tore a huge old lump of Lonicera apart a few weeks ago, we got 8 pieces out of it. They should all survive with care.
However, I would not re pot a tree of any value at the wrong time, let alone bare root.
The only exception is Satsuki which many growers advocate bare rooting when re potting. I might add that I do not.
Geoff.

Thanks Geoff for the reply

Can someone point me in the right direction (or to some good youtube videos) for root pruning techniques without bare rooting. I've gone through all my books and searched everywhere but all descriptions I've seen explain the re-potting process that involves bare-rooting...

Thanks

Haven't you got a club near you? Much better than youtube. None of my books tell that bare rooting has to be done. Get Bonsai Focus, look on their we site, videos are quite good.

Thanks for the info. Will have at B Focus but you're quite right...local club is probably the best source of info...

On conifers people do a partial bareroot. That is you reduce and prune the rootball and bareroot half. The second half is barerooted at the next repotting.

However, you cannot do anything to roots now, wait til next spring.

(Personally, I have barerooted a 3 gallon cotoneaster that had been in the nursery for quite some time. The roots completely filled the pot. It went into a smaller container with bonsai soil. I did NOT place it in a bonsai container the first time around. I think I reduced the size of the rootball maybe 3 times before it was placed into a small container. However, you are safe if you do things slowly and carefully.)

Good luck, join a club if possible for the best advice and guidance.

Thanks Augustine...that was exactly the info I was hoping for. Great help!!

Have a look at bonsai4me.com Harry also does several excellent books, well worth buying.

Thanks Geoffm....great website! Plenty of very useful info. Brilliant!

Oh and I realize that cotoneaster is not a conifer, was just using the repotting technique for conifers as an example.

It depends on the species, we have re potted Lonicera and also Cotoneaster in July and pretty much removed all soil, but thet plants were very cheap and to lose them would not be a big deal. I would never do that with a tree that cost money, or that I really liked and had done a lot of work on.
Geoff.