Crape myrtle | Bonsai South

A Couple Of Quick Progressions I Like

by Zach Smith | Jun 17, 2018 | Crape myrtle, Elms, Styling, Wiring

Bonsai is a pursuit that works best when given enough time. This is fairly obvious once you’ve studied enough. It’s the old trees that have been in training for decades (even centuries) that command our attention. Now, with that said I’m a big proponent of bringing a tree to a showable state in three to five years. One way to speed up the process is to harvest trees from the wild that have larger trunks than seedlings or nursery stock. Another is to field-grow specimens for the purpose of creating a thicker trunk with taper and movement. Here’s an example of each of these techniques. The bottom line? You can do a lot in three years, especially if you can get off to a solid start on your design in two to four months.

Here’s a Crape myrtle stump I lifted last month. I originally grew it from a small cutting, and a few years ago I planted it out for more rapid growth. The trunk base is now 1.5″ in diameter, which is plenty good for a small bonsai. You may also be able to see that this specimen has been chopped once, in order to build taper. I also took off another trunk emerging from the base, which I left to help thicken the trunk. This are common techniques for growing raw material.

Doesn’t look like much, does it?

This is two weeks later, in early June. I have enough growth to allow for the beginnings of a design.

I prefer to do my initial wiring on deciduous trees that have been collected as soon as the shoots are long enough and sturdy enough to take the wire. Why? Because it’s easier to bend a tender shoot and put it in the position I want it. Very simple.

This tree still doesn’t look like much, but it’s so much better than in the first photo ….

And here we are, two weeks after the photo above. Is this not an amazing degree of progress in a month and a half? Crape myrtles love summer, they’re super rooters, and you can build a wonderful bonsai from scratch is short order. The other good news? This tree will bloom next year, if not this year.

This tree is available at our Shop page. $95 delivered.

This Cedar elm was collected in February. As with the Crape above, the trunk base is 1.5″ in diameter. The really nice thing about this specimen is the trunk character – rugged bark, nice movement, good taper. No doubt it’s going to be a fine bonsai some day.

Here’s where we stood in early April. The first round of growth is underway, though not yet strong.

Much better. This is about six weeks after the photo above. I love wiring trees when they’re at this stage, as I mentioned above. No reason to put off getting a design in place.

Not much left compared to the shot above, is there? But that’s okay. I’m redirecting the energy the tree is expressing to those branches I need. This is what you have to do with all of your bonsai.

And here we are, a month after the photo above. I got the energy of this tree directed right where I wanted it. Look at the strength of those shoots. Also, the leader was a couple of feet long so I cut it back to continue the apex-building process.

And … I decided to go ahead and slip-pot to a bonsai container (an exquisite piece by Lary Howard). The tree had produced a lot of roots, so I’m confident it won’t bat an eye. Cedar elm is one of the toughest species out there.

Let me know what you think of these two quick progressions. I’d love to hear your comments.

Art In Small Packages

by Zach Smith | Apr 15, 2018 | Care, Crape myrtle, Potting

I’ve posted blogs about this old Crape myrtle, Lagerstroemia indica, that Allen Gautreau and I collected in the early 90s. He left it to me when he passed. I’ve since done some redesign work and put the tree in a different pot. That’s not the topic of this blog, however; rather, the oversized branch in the crown of the tree, which I removed as part of the redesign, was rooted last year and subsequently placed in a very small pot just for fun. Crapes are hard to kill, so it did its thing last fall, and naturally came through winter despite the really cold temps we had.

This is what my experiment looked like back in November of 2017. What’s cool about this specimen is the nice curves in the trunk. As with most species, Crape myrtles will grow perfectly straight branches. But Allen had trained this branch over some period of time, most likely cutting it back and allowing it to regrow a number of times. The result was curvy and nice, the sort of effect we strive for in our bonsai.

The only real problem I had with the composition above was simply a practical one. The pot, though nice in its own right, presented a problem in regard to the health of the small bonsai I’d made. For any of you who have worked much with shohin bonsai, perhaps the biggest challenge is keeping them moist. A common way to do this is to bury or partially bury the small pot in a container of soil or sand. This works fine, but you have to be aware that roots will grow through the drain hole of the small pot into the larger one. These you remove when you want to display the tree. And of course, you have to be cognizant of the repotting requirements of the tree. Crapes, being “super rooters,” must be repotted more frequently than most other species. So this small Crape was not going to thrive for long in the very small pot I’d first selected.

To fix the problem, I moved it into a nice Chuck Iker round I had. This additional room should make the difference. I also changed the planting angle, and I think the tree is much improved as a result. To give you an idea of scale, the trunk base of the tree is about 3/8″ in diameter. The style is obviously literati.

But the best part about this very small bonsai is that I think it qualifies as art. As we apply various techniques we’ve learned in the course of our bonsai studies, sometimes the unexpected happens. I think this is one of those cases. I loved the curves of the trunk from the start; finding the right potting angle and the right pot have really made this bonsai shine.

Fascinating Facts About 10 Bonsai Species

by Zach Smith | Jan 2, 2018 | American Elm, Bald Cypress, Crape myrtle, Dogwood, Elms, Hornbeam, Vines

There’s not much growing at this time of year, so I got to pondering some fascinating facts about 10 of the species I grow as bonsai. Here they are, in no particular order.

Bald Cypress - Taxodium Distichum

This species produces more trunk buds when collected as bare stumps than just about any other species. This makes branch selection almost problematic (too many choices!).

Holly - Ilex Species

This species have male and female flowers on different plants. The bright red fall berries occur only on the female plants. The leaves and stems of common Yaupon, Ilex vomitoria, were brewed into a tea by Native American men for use in purification and unity rituals. These rituals included vomiting, hence the scientific name given by Europeans when they originally classified the species. Only the Yaupon tea does not actually cause vomiting. Oops.

Crape Myrtle - Lagerstroemia Indica

With this species, new shoots are square when they first emerge. As they extend and thicken, they round off.

Flowering Dogwood - Cornus Florida

The beautiful white flowers are not flowers at all (as in flower petals), they’re white flower bracts. The actual flowers are yellow and inconspicuous, and reside in the center of the bracts.

Elms - Ulmus Species

Tricky to prune larger roots, as the bark will separate easily. Sawing works better, however, don’t saw straight through from one side or the bark will likely peel on the other side of the cut. (Even with experience you will likely make a mistake here and there when preparing collected elms.)

American elm – champion in leaf-size reduction, from 5” long in the wild to under ½” in a bonsai pot. This is the first image to your left. Six weeks later (image to your immediate left), this American elm already has much smaller leaves. Easy stuff!

Willow Leaf Ficus - Ficus Salicaria

This is perhaps the most popular fig species grown as bonsai, it is unknown in the wild (meaning you can’t go look at mature specimens in their natural habitat). The original plant was discovered in a Florida nursery by Joe Samuels, who eventually acquired and began propagating it. If you have one, it came from this single specimen.

American Hornbeam - Carpinus Caroliniana

This species grows continuously throughout the growing season, never pausing as most species do. There’s always fresh new growth. This trait is almost unique among species grown as bonsai.

Figs - Ficus Species

Figs are technically among the flowering plants (angiosperms), so where are the flowers? Actually, the flowers are inside the fruit and never “bloom” as we understand the term. Typically a specialized wasp enters the tiny opening at the end of the fruit to pollinate it.

Wisteria - Wisteria Floribunda

This species is quite the bean! I know we don’t tend to think of the lovely Wisteria in such terms, but as a member of the legume family Wisteria is related to all of the beans and peas. Once the stunning flowers have done their thing each year, a pod slowly but surely develops until it’s quite obvious by fall.

Did You Enjoy?

This was a fun topic for me. I sure hope you enjoyed the read. Drop me a comment below; I really enjoy hearing from people who love bonsai as much as I love it!

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The Learning Never Stops – Here Are A Few Survivors

by Zach Smith | Nov 11, 2017 | Bald Cypress, Crape myrtle, Elms, Potting

I do all sorts of things with trees, some good and some bad but all with the best of intentions. The ultimate goal is a great bonsai that really makes you think it’s a real tree. My preference is to speed up the process as much as possible. Here are a few examples of trees that (so far) have survived my good intentions.

You probably remember this Cedar elm, Ulmus crassifolia, from a couple of weeks ago. I was trying to decide which pot worked best, and most of you picked this one. Last weekend I took the plunge and slip-potted it. It doesn’t seem to have minded at all.

Here’s another victim of fall slip-potting, a nice Bald cypress (Taxodium distichum). As with the Cedar elm, it didn’t mind a bit. Not even the slightest protest.

Here’s a Crape myrtle, Lagerstroemia indica (purple flowers), made from a cutting this year. What I like about it is the neat movement in the trunk – which was originally nice movement in a branch I pruned off of another bonsai and rooted. That got me to thinking literati.

I had this neat small pot lying around, so after some quick pruning and wiring and a lot of root-pruning, voila! A very small literati Crape myrtle. I don’t know yet, but I suspect it’ll come through fine.

God Bless The Ever-Reliable Crape Myrtle

by Zach Smith | Nov 3, 2017 | Care, Crape myrtle, ZPC

Living in the Deep South has some advantages. Fall color on bonsai trees is not one of them. So imagine my surprise when I noticed this guy last evening

Lovely fall color, right? Crapes tend to produce fall color down here when most other deciduous species just end up with ugly leaves that fall off. So God bless them. I’ve got splashes of color on my benches right now thanks to the Crapes. You may recognize this tree as my legacy Crape myrtle from Allen Gautreau. I repotted it this year and began the redesign work vital to improving the tree. It’s a bit overgrown, but I needed it to grow out this year before getting another hard pruning this coming spring. I should be able to achieve nice ramification in 2018. Another repotting may be needed in 2019; I’ll know better then. Crapes are super-rooters. I hope you’re having some nice fall color where you are.

This Crape Is Superb – How Did I Do On The Initial Styling?

by Zach Smith | Sep 9, 2017 | Care, Crape myrtle, Styling, Wiring

I recently acquired a couple of Crape myrtles, Lagerstoemia indica, from a grower, this one and a Pokomoke I’m planning to keep for myself. The only thing I’ve done to this specimen since I got it was to take off a large leader in back of the tree (you’ll see where a few photos from now). Today I decided it was time to do some styling – there were numerous shoots coming from the area of the chop, and if I didn’t wire them now the wood would quickly become too stiff for me to do anything about it.

In this photo I’ve done three things: trim the the crown lightly to remove or shorten shoots as needed; remove some dead knobs where pruning has been done before; and put some wire on the lowest left branch. You can see the style of this tree right off the bat. It’s going to be a classic Crape myrtle shape. Isn’t the trunk lovely? Great movement and taper, and of course the nebari and root base is superb..

Here’s a shot from the back of the tree.

This shows you pretty clearly that large chop point I made. There are several shoots emerging from the perimeter of the chop point. This is what I expected and planned for. I’ll be able to wire a couple of leaders off this point, continuing the design..

Now I’ve selected and wired two of the shoots (I’ve already taken off most of the ones I didn’t need). These shoots will thicken some before fall of this year, and next year they’ll really take off.

And here’s a closeup of the chop point. Crape myrtle shoots are unique in that once they begin to swell their shape is square rather than round, and this persists for a short time.

My task is to select and wire two of these shoots, then shape and position them properly so that during next year’s growing season they’ll fill in their part of the crown.

This is a good place for a tip on wiring Crape myrtles. When you go to remove individual leaves, such as those near the base of a branch, you must carefully pull them off directly away from the base. If you don’t do this right, a slender string of green bark tissue will peel off down the branch. This is not necessarily harmful to the tree, but it’s not good technique and frustrate you. So practice, practice, practice.

Another shot of the back of the tree.

And the finished styling. I trimmed the crown to shape for today, meaning the amount that would make the tree’s silhouette look as it will once the detailed work is done in the crown. Next spring, a harder pruning needs to be done, followed by a complete wiring of the new growth once it’s out.

The base of this tree measures 4″ above the root crown, and it’s about 28″ tall. The flowers are white. If you’re looking for a large, stunning Crape myrtle specimen for your collection, this tree is available at our Crape Myrtle Bonsai page.

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