Bald Cypress bonsai growing in water

[stacy allen muse]

here are a couple of pics , of a "future bonsai". that I have been growing in a cement mixing tub, no soil, just water and spagnum moss, since I collected it from a lake... more than a couple of years ago.
I just cut about a foot and a half off the top this winter, and other than the woody top branch shooting off at a 45, all this years growth...
Trimmed a little of the top to help send some more new growth down below... but starting to get there...

 

[Redwood Ryan]

Did it look like this when collected?

 

[stacy allen muse]

yes, and no ... like I said it was alot taller and I felt that height made the tree look to young, in proportion to the size of the trunk... the top woody branch that I was talking about, originally was the bottom branch, other than that yes, but she has put on quite a bit of weight. Got a long way to go though ...

 

[Redwood Ryan]

I wasn't talking so much in height, but in trunk overall. Did it have this kind of a look to it or was this caused by the water?

 

[stacy allen muse]

the arial roots??? what had happened due to rise and fall of water levels at where the tree was collected the roots formed at various levels on the trunk. This was a rather young tree when collected, and normally I probally would not have collected it, but my uncle kept cutting it down.(was in the way of where he puts his boats in the water) and I thought while I was there I would remove it too. Normally I would have cut the arial roots off, but they kinda grew on me, it's not often you see one with the roots incorporated in the overall look of the tree.
They have thicken tremendously !!!

 

[catfish chapstick]

its deffinately different from anything i've ever seen. these don't grow in my area so i know nothing really.. i will say that i like its grotesque uniqueness. looks like a tree-swamp-creature.

what are your future plans for this beast?

 

[rockm]

You will have issues down the road (if not already) with inverse taper in the trunk--it's thinner BELOW the roots. The swelling roots ware also swelling the trunk above the base. Although it won't really make much difference with a wild trunk and design like this, developing BC with roots all up and down the trunk will not develop the fluted, ridged surface nebari that makes some BC distinctive.

 

[stacy allen muse]

as far as future plans for this tree, right now I am just letting it go till winter, as mentioned before, this is all new growth, from last winter. Then I want to start working on thickening the lower branches, to do this I will prob. end up taking most of the top branches off... with these trees,since they grow very tall, it is always easier to let the top grow, than the bottom. I will leave the roots on, even though there is concern about reverse taper, which is correct... This I believe I can counter act by two ways. The first, is letting the roots grow together and fuse with the trunk, the second is the growth of lower branches below the roots, which should aid in giving the trunk below the roots some girth... only time will tell...

 

[stacy allen muse]

Thought I would update with some new photos...

Normally I would have waited for this tree to go dormant and drop all it's leaves before doing the work that I did, because one shouldn't really be doing any work on them so late in the year.

With that said, the branches grew very fast and I felt that if I didn't start getting some wire on them soon, I wouldn't be able to get such a bend in them... so I felt it was worth taking a risk.
Also, I have been very fortunate, in that this tree has been very responsive. I also did some top triming, and thining out, in hopes that I would increase some of the growth further down and thicken up some more branches at the base.

 

[edprocoat]

Stacy, I really like this tree! This looks like many of the trees I see over near the coast off the intercoastal waterway where the tide changes the water levels. This is unique and will make a beauty of a specimen, it looks great already. i bet those roots will fuse with the trunk in time, but the way in the first pics it looked as if some growth was coming from where the roots came from the trunk this will be very unique tree.

ed

 

[stacy allen muse]

ed, thanks appreciate it... there is some growth that pops up all the time down by the base, but I usually pull it off. I don't want any growth lower than my bottom left branch that I just wired. I am just working this tree branch by branch and continuing to wack the top, I am really in no hurry with it...

 

[electronfusion]

Have the images been removed from this thread? I'm logged in, and see people's thumbnails just fine, but I don't see the tree photos being discussed.

 

[Dav4]

Have the images been removed from this thread? I'm logged in, and see people's thumbnails just fine, but I don't see the tree photos being discussed.

The OP left this forum years ago and, iirc, took his photos with him apparently. Not sure that’s possible today but that’s how I remember things playing out with this individual and his threads.