Southern Bonsai Blog » General

400-Year-Old Bonsai

aaron — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 02:20:44 +0000

Interesting report on a Japanese White Pine at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum in Washington by VOANews.com.

Lindsay Farr’s World of Bonsai Series 2

aaron — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 02:24:34 +0000

I just got finished watching the first episode of Lindsay Farr’s World of Bonsai Series 2 and this series continues to be fascinating (I’m a little behind since it was posted 6 months ago). I think anyone who loves bonsai should be following this series and watching the videos. I encourage everyone to head over to Vimeo and subscribe to this series and watch the episodes that have already been released. If you haven’t watched World of Bonsai Series 1, then you have a lot of catching up to do, but it will be well worth your time.

http://www.bonsaifarm.tv is the World of Bonsai web site, and here is a list of all of Lindsay Farr’s videos on Vimeo.

Let it snow!

aaron — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 01:13:17 +0000

In most areas of the country, snow is simply a part of winter. In the South, however, it *may* come once per year and most of the time that doesn’t stick to the ground. We had a really good snow this year though, and for some of my bonsai, it was their first time to deal with it. We got about 4 inches a few weeks ago (yes, I’m just getting around to blogging about it), but even with that much, it was gone by lunch. Nevertheless, here’s some pictures.

Juniper in snow

Bonsai bench in snow

Air Layering Resources

aaron — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:32:32 +0000

Bonsai Bark did a nice series in the past couple of months on air-layering. If you have mature yard trees, a well-developed branch you need to remove, or would like the chance to start over with your nebari, then air-layering is definitely something to look into. Here’s the links:

A Simple Air-layering Technique Part 1
A Simple Air-layering Technique Part 2
A Simple Air-layering Technique Part 3

Here’s an explanation of the process and why it works over at EverGreen Garden Works: What is Air Layering?

Some other resources:

Layering Techniques for Bonsai

Ground Layering at Bonsai4Me

Airlayering by the Texas Agriculture Extension Office

If you have any other resources about air layering and it’s relationship with bonsai, send me the links and I’ll add them to this post.

Shin-Boku – Japanese Garden Trees

aaron — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 22:30:27 +0000

This site is really amazing and something I was reading about at Stone Lantern’s Blog called Bonsai Bark. Shin-Boku Nurseries create specimen garden trees and the images are incredible. If a person wasn’t standing beside the tree, I would think it was a bonsai, and I guess technically, it is.

Shin-Boku Specimen Pine

Shin-Boku Nursery

Help me ID this tree!

aaron — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 00:46:09 +0000

If you have ever needed to ID a bonsai that: wasn’t correctly labeled, didn’t have a label at all, or that you collected, then help might be a click away. If your an experienced bonsai artist, you may be able to help others ID their plants. MyPlantID.com

My Plant ID began in January 2008 as a plant identification service. People from all over the world sent us photographs of their plants and we identified them for free. The demand was overwhelming. When we realized that we couldn’t keep up with the amount of daily submissions, we knew something had to change. At the same time, there was a large number of plant enthusiasts who contacted us, eager to help identify. The result is www.myplantid.com. With you help and curiosity, we hope to build myplantid into the premier plant identification website and forum.
Features:

* Identify plants online.
* Search by leaf features (arrangement, shape, margin, vein) and location.
* Submit plant image and let users identify it.
* Organize and keep track of all your garden plants online .
* Contribute by identifying plats of others.
* Registration required, free.

Jim Smith Bonsai

aaron — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 23:32:38 +0000

Orlando Bonsai had a post on it’s blog today about Jim Smith’s Bonsai nursery. This nursery has been providing wholesale bonsai material since 1979. If your wife is looking for a beach location and your wanting to do a little scouting on the side, check out Vero Beach, Florida so you can swing by Jim Smith’s.

View Larger Map

My Bonsai RSS Bundle

aaron — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 02:48:24 +0000

I have created a Google Reader RSS bundle for those that like to read Bonsai blogs. If you click the link below, then subscribe to this bundle (you’ll need a Google or GMail account), then you will automatically subscribe to the 33 bonsai blogs that I have been able to find in Google Reader. Just go to http://www.google.com/reader to read the updates every day. Here’s the link: Google Reader Bonsai Bundle

If you use another reader, here is the OPML file to import: Bonsai Blogs OPML File

By the way, I have been having problems with my RSS feed. It showed errors if you looked at it in Google Reader or Feedburner. If you received a lot of updates in your RSS reader today, this is why.

The Behr Bonsai Scholarship

aaron — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 02:04:54 +0000

Passing along information about a good cause for bonsai and for education. Behr Appleby passed away in May of this year and contributed a lot of knowledge to the bonsai community.

Bonsai Vault has established a scholarship fund in the memory of Behr (Grampz) Appleby (1948-2009) to skilled students / enthusiasts of bonsai seeking a education to improve their art and the bonsai community as a whole. The scholarship will be awarded to an individual(s) for the purpose of achieving a more advanced level of bonsai.

The concept of this scholarship is to encourage and support budding bonsai artists in the fashion Behr showed and demonstrated through his commitment to the art over many, many years. In turn, any individual(s) receiving this scholarship must, with in one year of the award, demonstrate to the Behr Bonsai Scholarship Fund the knowledge that they have acquired. This demonstration of knowledge must be displayed in four distinct different ways.

Here’s more information and a button to donate: The Behr Bonsai Scholarship

Here’s the forum thread showing the balance of the fund: Scholarship Balance and Contributions

bonsai scholarship

Indian Hawthorn

aaron — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 19:33:07 +0000

As a groomsmen’s gift for my best man, I had bought this tree in hopes of giving it to him to grow eventually into a bonsai. Fortunately, I found a great bald cypress at a good price instead. The bald cypress will be much easier to take care of for a beginner bonsai artist because it’s so tough. This indian hawthorn will have to just stay in my collection while I explore the possibilities of where it should go and it lets me know where it wants to go. Some have very large leaves and multiple trunks, but this one has a nice single trunk and smaller leaves than many of the other varieties. Should stand up to the summer heat and be easy to take care of. It’ll either be a great bonsai specimen one day, or an excellent addition to my garden :)

Indian Hawthorn