Chinese Elm - seiju (1st time posting)

[Mikea454]

Have loved and appreciated bonsais for a long time, this is my third attempt to get into Bonsai creation and this time I'm going to make sure it sticks (finally not a broke student that can afford a way to water over vacations )

Starting a bunch of seeds, but while I wait I bought a few seedlings to learn with. The conifers were pretty straight forward, but I received two Chinese Elm - seiju seedlings that were marketed as bonsai starters today. These have me a little stumped and since I've been reading this forum for weeks now I thought I'd ask here. Two issues:

1. The main trunks are already quite wooded and I don't think they can be bent more than a few degrees without breaking. I wanted broom style anyway so maybe this won't be a huge issue. It looks like someone cropped the main trunk line maybe last year, but otherwise no steps towards making a workable bonsai.

2. They almost exclusively have branches to two opposing sides and nothing front or back (like 2 dimensional) perhaps this is common with the seiju variety, but it's making it really hard to decide a plan for these little guys.

I'm on 6b near Boston, so spring is already underway, I can prune tips in the Fall and try to created some more secondary branches to fill the void in the front or back. But I would like to see some thicker trunks.


- do I prune this fall or.skip to next year?
- do I wire some of these primary branches now?
- do I trim of some of the parallel branches now or give it some time thicker up and create some more ramification before I pick the keepers?
- is there a way to create any movement in this trunk or is it too late

sorry for the long post. all help and guidance is very appreciated

-Michael

 

[TrevorLarsen]

At this point I would just let them grow. Before they wake up next spring I would repot them, but this year I would just keep them alive and start doing research. Here is a Seiju I repotted this year. I would just let yours grow until it’s around this size.

 

[Mikea454]

At this point I would just let them grow. Before they wake up next spring I would repot them, but this year I would just keep them alive and start doing research. Here is a Seiju I repotted this year. I would just let yours grow until it’s around this size. View attachment 544511View attachment 544512View attachment 544513View attachment 544510

beautiful tree, did it start as flat as mine? (if so, do you do anything special to get it to branch to the front or back?). Why such a severe pruning, what are you trying to get it to do?

 

[Mikea454]

follow-up
they feel pretty root bound in there, is it not worth giving them a bigger pot this year?

 

[Srt8madness]

The trunks can certainly be bent still, but clip and grow works just fine too. Severe cut backs pushes growth closer to the trunk and branches.
You can wire branches forwards or backwards to change direction. Pruning back will sprout a lot of new growth as well, likely all over the trunk.

You could tease the roots out and put in a bigger pot to drive more growth, it's a bit late to do more major root work.

 

[TrevorLarsen]

I would basically just let them grow wild. I bought mine already this big and it was like $40. Elms grow well so it shouldn’t take too long. A severe pruning will aid in creating more taper meaning going from thick to thin. Also you want the ramification to start close to the trunk so it helps that too.

 

[Balbs]

These grow well and back bud well in our area. I think the above guidance is good. Let us grow to thicken up and when you’re satisfied (I often see guidance of about 2/3 the desired finished diameter), you’re likely going to chop the trunk where you want the first branching of your broom to start. I had one of these for a while. They’re pretty tough and fun to work with. My recollection is that when flex a lot but when they break, it’s sudden.

 

[Mikea454]

Wow, these things thickened up and leafed out like crazy. Definitely not bending them now. Only 2.5 months and the one on the right easily doubled its trunk diameter