Sprint Re-potting

Over the past month I've re-potted trees into larger training pots or good Bonsai pots. The larger African Strangler and Green Island Ficus, along with the Brazilian Rain tree were potted in nice 6 inch Bonsai pots while cuttings were placed in various training pots.

For the Brazilian Rain Tree I did little in the way of root pruning. I tend not to heavily prune roots but cut them back enough to give comfortable room in the pot. Any large roots may be pruned away but I try to maintain as much of the fine roots as possible. I find that the roots grow pretty fast and it may be necessary to re-pot after a year's growth. I am leaving the Texas Ebony and large African Strangler in their pots without re-potting this season to test if waiting to re-pot every 2 years will cause any problems. 

Brazilian Rain Tree

African Strangler

Green Island

Soil

With re-potting comes the need to replenish my stock of Bonsai soil. Growing small trees reduces the need for large quantities of soil so I can buy commercially packaged soil and with a few additions, create the medium that I need.

There are 3 main qualities necessary for a good Bonsai soil:

• Drainage
• Moisture Retention
• Aeration

Drainage

Being that the trees are confined to a small pot, water can easily collect and eventually rot the tree roots. The soil should allow water to quickly drain through and out the drainage holes of the pot.

Moisture Retention

Even though water drains quickly through the soil, the soil needs to stay damp and not dry out too quickly. Moist soil allows the roots to get the water they need without harm.

Aeration

Lastly, the soil can become compact from normal watering if there isn't an element to the soil that helps to loosen it. Roots need air and space to develop properly.

In order to achieve these goals, it may be necessary to create a custom mix of ingredients to make a growing medium for trees to thrive.

My mix:

• Commercial packaged soil (TinyRoots All-Purpose Blend)  50%
• Akadama  25%
• Lava rock  25%

The TinyRoots blend makes up the balk of the soil and provides a good base for the organic component. It has mainly compost mulch and gives the trees the essential nutrients and soil structure. This soil also drains well while retaining some moisture.

Akadama is a clay-like soil used for bonsai in Japan. It occurs naturally but may be further dried. This element also helps in moisture retention while its larger particles loosens the soil allowing air to flow.

Finally, the lava rock gives the soil a courser texture to help with aeration and root development. Overall, this soil mix has worked very well so far. It's a simple mix with easy to find the ingredients and satisfies the requirements of good bonsai soil. 

Spring Plans

We are moving to mid February and time to start making some plans for spring. I generally do any re-potting and major pruning in March so that the trees have the Summer to recover and grow.

Re-potting

I'm going to leave some of the trees in their pots for another year without doing any work but I have 3 trees to re-pot. The Brazilian Raintree, upright Green Island Ficus and a Dwarf African Strangler are the trees that will move from training pots to nicer bonsai pots. I'm staying with the neutral brown, rectangular pots as I like the simplicity and consistency of the look.

Major pruning

The larger, somewhat Banyan style, African Strangler is scheduled for some major pruning. Now that the tree has been growing well over it's second Summer, it's time for some pruning/defoliation to help encourage ramification.

I'm planning on some really radical changes to the Port Jackson fig. I want to take some branches as cuttings that may work well for smaller trees and saw the main trunks down to smaller stumps. If this tree survives, then I could have a smaller tree with more dense foliage at some point in the future. At least that is the plan.

Special project

I have a small African Strangler that could work well for a root over rock style. I've already selected some nice rocks so this can be a nice longer term project.

So... I'm just gathering supplies and waiting for the weather to warm up! 

Green Island Ficus

The Green Island Ficus is an easy tree to grow and thrives in USDA Zone 10-11. It's leaves are round shaped and the tree can produce small ornamental figs. Like other Ficus trees, the Green Island Ficus can grow in low light so it's a suitable tree to grow indoors.

I have two of the trees that are clippings from a larger tree and both are around 2 years old now and growing very well. The trees are on the same schedule of fertilizing which is twice a month during the winter months.

One of the trees is growing in a more formal upright style while the other I've training in a slant style to provide a bit of movement. The upright tree has a larger back branch that I will probably prune off in the Spring and grow another cutting.

Texas Ebony – Pithecellobium Flexicaule

Similar to the Brazilian Rain Tree, the Texas Ebony has compound leaves and grows thorns over the trunk and branches. Native to Texas and the Southwest United States, the tree grows well in USDA Zone 10-11.

Branch structure displays a distinctive difference for the Texas Ebony. Branches grow in a zig zag manner with thorns at the nodes. This pattern provides an obvious point for pruning the tree as a clip and grow method works very well.

Texas Ebony can also grow flowers and seed pods but I haven't seen any nor do I really expect to in the bonsai format. One thing for certain is that the tree grows pretty fast with new shoots continuing to sprout from previous cut points.

Wiring can be difficult because of the hard, woody branches and I normally just prune at the branch nodes, however, recently I’ve wired a thinner, softer branch in order to adjust its direction. It wasn’t particularly difficult and I’ll leave the wire on for the winter to see how well this may work.

This particular tree has a very twisted, serpentine trunk/root base that is definitely unusual. I continue to have mixed feelings about the look but the tree is now much more substantial so I may consider doing something with this at a spring re-potting.  

Leaf Pruning

I’ve let my small trees grow and now it’s time to do a little leaf pruning. The purpose behind leaf pruning is to encourage ramification which is the increase in branching. Another desired effect is growing smaller leaves. With an increase in the number of branches, more leaves mean smaller leaves. I’ve only done partial defoliation on two Green Island Ficus trees by pruning off the largest leaves and that has worked pretty well in reducing leaf size.

I hadn't done any pruning on the cuttings from the Dwarf African Strangler but now they've grown enough to take off a few leaves. In the Spring I'm planning to try a root over rock style with one of these and probably re-potting the other two out of their training pots. 

Before Pruning

After Pruning

Brazilian Rain Tree - Pithecellobium Tortum

The Brazilian Rain Tree is a very interesting and beautiful tree. This tree is similar to another tree in my collection – the Texas Ebony. Both of these trees have compound leaves and grow thorns on the branches and trunk.

The Brazilian Rain Tree is native to, well Brazil and is suitable for growing in USDA Zone 10-11. That means the minimum temperature should not be below around 40F. So while these trees will grow well in warm and hot summer weather outside in the US, they need to be brought inside during the colder months where outdoor temperatures will drop below the minimum.

The tree has hard wood but rather delicate soft green branches that grow out long and a little floppy that will eventually harden. What is truly interesting about this species are the leaves. The tree grows compound leaves – a shoot will have 4-6 pairs of opposing leaves and cool thing is that the leaves fold together and close at night. The same behavior can occur on very sunny days as the leaves may partially fold in order to regulate the light striking their surface. The Brazilian Rain Tree also produces white flowers but that may or may not occur with a bonsai. My tree hasn't produced any flowers.

Another unique feature of this tree are the long thorns that adorn the trunk and some of the more mature branches. Unlike the Texas Ebony, these thorns are rather large given the smaller size of my tree and almost look like short branches. I have pruned a few back to remove some clutter but generally speaking I've kept them at least at this point.

The tree that I have is maybe a few years old--- I bought it this summer so it is pretty young. I understand that more mature trees develop flaky bark that peels off to add different color and texture to the trunk.

Watering & Fertilizing

I follow the same watering method as the other trees with the soil moist to a little dry before the next watering. Most times indoors that means watering every other or third day. Good soil drainage is very important with this tree as with all bonsai.

During the summer when most of the growth takes place I fertilize every weekend with a basic 20-20-20 water soluble fertilizer. I'll probably cut back to once per month in the winter.