A regular update on the life and times of John Hanby’s Newstead Bonsai Centre……..
Topical Times – Rob’s one to one
Rob came to the studio earlier this week for a one to one and his car was totally filled with trees……..although as usual there was much more room in his car on the journey home. What else would you expect!
All the trees were discussed in detail before carrying out any work…… and on completion of the pruning work advice was given on what to do with each tree for the remainder of the growing season.
We had only recently put the Larch and Metasequoia forests together so this was their first real pruning. They had been allowed to extend to promote new root growth and now were pruned back roughly to shape. Lower branches were left unpruned. More detailed and selective pruning work will be carried out in the autumn when the trees have dropped their foliage.
The Zelkova had branches which had been left to grow to fatten them up. Most branches were now shortened and inner shoots were also cut back.
The Juniper Squamata Meyerii now had too big a canopy and wire that was beginning to bite in. Some general pruning back was carried out and now all the wire needs to be removed. At the end of the growing season a branch selection and pruning will be undertaken prior to the tree being totally rewired and styled.
The Taxus had now been in this pot for eighteen months having been dug out of a hedge. Unchecked growth had been encouraged to enable new roots to develop. We now discussed several styling possibilities and all branches that would not be used at all were removed. The tree will again be allowed to grow unchecked but at least now it grows where we want and improves our styling possibilities.
The Elm air layer was pruned back to promote a broom style shape and improve basic branch structure.
All in all this was a very productive day and all these trees are back on track for the remainder of the growing season. Rob’s car is lighter and roomier whereas my compost bins are full…….sounds like another successful bonsai class!!!
