Junipers
Junipers, both wild and cultivated make great bonsai. Check these articles for some of the many fascinating aspects of juniper bonsai.
How Many Dimensions Does a Bonsai Have?
In the December 2020 Zoom-hosted meeting with BSSF and Andrew Robson; one message from Andrew’s presentation that has stuck in my brain. Andrew covered a lot of great points but this one thing had me thinking again and again. More on that later. Rewind to March of 2020 when I was cleaning up one of […]
Branch Flattening for Light Optimization and Taper Control in Juniper Stock
Refinement and stock growing are often two entirely separate parts of the bonsai process. Whenever we are working on plants from a young age the aim is to create the best tree possible in the shortest possible time. If you find the opportunity to combine parts of the trunk growing or “building” stage of growing […]
Shrinking a Juniper
I recently worked on this small juniper; it seems to be a cutting grown Kishu juniper (J. chinensis “kishu”.) Kishu has a slightly tighter growth habit with more plump tips than the “Shimpaku” variety, and a bit more coarse than Itoigawa, the preferred variety in much of Japan. I’ve discovered that any of these three […]
Big Junipers -Splits, Bends and Grafts
I’ve been fortunate to have the chance to study many world-class trees in Japan and the US, giving me the opportunity to think about how they were made. When it comes to making great juniper bonsai out of yamadori material there are a few tricks and complications that can force compromise when you really get […]
Reflections on The Artisans Cup
I left San Francisco at 7am on the Wednesday morning before The Artisans Cup to drive over to Alameda to meet up with Jonas Dupuich. Among other things we were taking my grafted California Juniper and accompanying pieces up to Portland, Oregon for the show. Both Jonas and I were happy that most of the […]
Too Straight for a Juniper
In bonsai, Junipers are supposed to be all twisty and contorted. That’s the rule. So, I guess we should all just ignore the tree that I’ve been working on for the last few years – it’s too straight for a juniper. Check back next time I post something. But seriously, where do the rules come […]
Yamadori Style Kishu
I think it was back in 2007 that Jim Gremel did a workshop for BSSF, the somewhat-infamous Yamadori-style juniper workshops where he takes young trees and wires them into crazy shapes. His concept is great, it’s just that the execution takes a long time. I wired a couple trees during that workshop and recall him […]
Juniper Grafts
Road to the Cup – Part 2 If you’re not grafting on junipers that you have in development then you’re likely not making really great bonsai, it’s that simple. While trees grown from cuttings can become really good in time, much of the juniper trunk stock that exists either from old landscape plants, wild trees […]
Material Selection
Road to The Cup- Part 1 I mentioned in my last post that the tree that I’ll be bringing to The Artisans Cup was a castoff sales table tree that turned into a keeper. The selection of material to work on in bonsai is the first task for a bonsai artist; it is equal in […]
The Cup
Some of the most serious bonsai enthusiasts from across the country received an email on June 30th informing them of the status of their entries for The Artisans Cup, Exhibition of American Bonsai. I had some musings after my conversation in April with Ryan Neil, the creator and organizer of the cup. What would the […]
