Re: olive Challenge

Rob Kempinski Sat Jul 09, 2011 6:20 pm

jrodriguez wrote:
Rob Kempinski wrote:

No Olives in Florida? Yikes, I recently acquired a nice one.

Rob and Dorothy,

Here in Puerto Rico we can grow olives. I have one that has been in a bonsai pot for more than 40 years, as well as one others that came from Mallorca. The best is Olea Europea, Var. sylvestris, which is sometimes sold as 'little ollie' and can be found growing in orchards in California. They definitely love sun, a fast draining medium (with little to no organic matter) and wind. If left in an area without wind and given the high humidity in Florida, all the branches will get mildew/fungus and the tree will begin to die back. This happened to some friends in the Miami area, some of which bought collected Mallorca Ullastres (olives) from me.

As far as pests go, be sure to spray it with malathion for scale insects. You will usually see them in the leaves.

Warm regards,

Jose Luis

Thanks for the tips Jose.
When is a good time to repot? I don't like the soil it's in, it might have been okay for California but seems too organic for Florida.

jrodriguez Sun Jul 10, 2011 12:32 am

Rob,

If the tree is in an organic mix, you may be able to wash all the soil and replace it with soil less mix. Mine are planted in 100% mountain sand. Before, I used lava, but found out that durning the rainy season it retained entirely too much water. Considering the materials that are available in your area, a mixture of Chatahochee, lava and hard akadama in equal parts will work well.

New healthy growth is purplelish in color. Once the tree starts developing roots, you should see this happening. Remember, drainage is indispensable!!!

Kind regards.

Jose Luis

Rob Kempinski Sun Jul 10, 2011 3:42 am

jrodriguez wrote:Rob,

If the tree is in an organic mix, you may be able to wash all the soil and replace it with soil less mix. Mine are planted in 100% mountain sand. Before, I used lava, but found out that durning the rainy season it retained entirely too much water. Considering the materials that are available in your area, a mixture of Chatahochee, lava and hard akadama in equal parts will work well.

New health growth is purplelish in color. Once the tree starts developing roots, you should see this happening. Remember, drainage is indispensable!!!

Kind regards.

Jose Luis

I have those materials. Is now a good time or early spring?

jrodriguez Sun Jul 10, 2011 4:17 am

Rob,

I don't see a problem with you doing it now. You still have enough time for the tree to recover. It will be worst if the mix it is in niw stays too wet. If it does, you will notice that the leaves will begin to turn yellow and drop off. If there is one thing that can surely kill an olive tree ( at least in my area) is wet feet. First the top portion begins to die. Second, the tree begins to issue suckers from its base. If these aren't eliminated, they can soon take over.

I imagine you got yours from Roy Nagatoshi. If so, his trees are always healthy. As far as soli goes, you should change it soon. You will see the difference.

Kind regards,

Jose Luis

ferdy-san Sun Jul 10, 2011 1:45 pm

Fantastic material, and fantastic transformation, keep on with the good work, this is my favorite species to, regards from Portugal...

moshe emergui Mon Jul 11, 2011 9:00 am

dorothy7774 wrote:Very nicely done, Moshe! And - it is a real tree, not a virtual.. Good example of material with age and maturity, something a bonsai should have and one can never create with young material.

Always enjoy to make virts of material that I cannot grow here in Florida!

-dorothy

Thank you Dorothy, it's always great pleasure to work with high quality raw material, old and more ...
I'm very pleased with the result and I believe that progress of the tree will be pretty quick in this case 2-3 years
Thank you again for a wonderful virtual imaging.

moshe emergui Mon Jul 11, 2011 9:07 am

ferdy-san wrote:Fantastic material, and fantastic transformation, keep on with the good work, this is my favorite species to, regards from Portugal...

Thank you ferdy-san .this is my favorite species .I have hundreds of olive trees, some excellent .

moshe emergui Mon Jul 11, 2011 9:22 am

jrodriguez wrote:Rob,

If the tree is in an organic mix, you may be able to wash all the soil and replace it with soil less mix. Mine are planted in 100% mountain sand. Before, I used lava, but found out that durning the rainy season it retained entirely too much water. Considering the materials that are available in your area, a mixture of Chatahochee, lava and hard akadama in equal parts will work well.

New healthy growth is purplelish in color. Once the tree starts developing roots, you should see this happening. Remember, drainage is indispensable!!!

Kind regards.

Jose Luis

In my experience ,I use a mixture of 50% tuff (lava) 0-4 mm 30% peat and 20% coconut mixture for planting. this Mixture works better in my country for most of my bonsai including olive trees.drainage,drainage It is very important in olive trees

Andrija Zokic Mon Jul 11, 2011 11:25 am

I use 85% baked loam and 15% white peat for my olives. USDA zone 9.

http://www.animabonsai.com/2011/07/olea-europaea-today/

Rob Kempinski Mon Jul 11, 2011 2:40 pm

moshe emergui wrote:
jrodriguez wrote:Rob,

If the tree is in an organic mix, you may be able to wash all the soil and replace it with soil less mix. Mine are planted in 100% mountain sand. Before, I used lava, but found out that durning the rainy season it retained entirely too much water. Considering the materials that are available in your area, a mixture of Chatahochee, lava and hard akadama in equal parts will work well.
Jose Luis
In my experience ,I use a mixture of 50% tuff (lava) 0-4 mm 30% peat and 20% coconut mixture for planting. this Mixture works better in my country for most of my bonsai including olive trees.drainage,drainage It is very important in olive trees

Thanks Moshe, Your olives are impressive. I assume Israel doesn't get too much rain. Where I live is very humid and wet. I repotted the tree yesterday. It had great roots very radially spread. And it was obviously flat cut at some point in the past. The soil I used us a Japanese product called Aoki. It's a mixture of Fuji, Kiri and Akadama products from Japan. Drains well and is recommend for older trees that need good drainage.

Moshe, When you collect your trees. How much of a root ball do you strive to get?

Rob Kempinski Mon Jul 11, 2011 2:49 pm

Andrija Zokic wrote:I use 85% baked loam and 15% white peat for my olives. USDA zone 9.

http://www.animabonsai.com/2011/07/olea-europaea-today/

Interesting shape - has potential what are you planning to do with it?

Andrija Zokic Mon Jul 11, 2011 3:30 pm

I need more green, but not much more. I want little longer right branch. Left side of crown is still undefined and needs to be more transparent and smaller. Better pot also is welcome.

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