In my humble opinion...if you like big butts you won't find them in the yard...they only come from the swamp! I've been on here for 16 years and the conversations about BC haven't changed one bit...I've yet to see the first one grown in a container with a big buttress and fluting. If you want the real thing you are going to have pony up one way or another.
Depth of flooding of Bald Cypress affects buttressing??
- Thread starter Joe Dupre'
- Start date
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Yup. Want dramatic buttress and fluting?, collected trees are really the only way to get it.
How does "Root Pouch" pinch roots and the others do not if I can ask. Aren't they build about the same?
Maiden69
Masterpiece
Remember thought that while my trees are flooded all the time, it is by no means standing water. It gets used and replenish daily during the growing season, and the new water is sprayed into the root ball, and then it floods out into the container. Also, every week I add about 4+ tablespoons of H2O2 to kill the algae, which may or may not have an effect on total oxygen in the water.
I am rearranging my grow out set up, hopefully it will be completed this weekend. I will try to post pics on my thread. I am also adding an air pump, just gave up on an electric one and shopping for a cheap solar powered one, it only needs to run during daytime to have the effect that I want.
What time of the year is best to collect older trees down south?
Maiden69
Masterpiece
Nope, they are not built the same. A lot of fabric bags let the tip of the root protrude, which ends up being air-pruned, just like a colander will do. Rootpouch fiber entraps the root tip and "kills" it, just like if you were to cut off the tip, promoting branching. Same concept Dr. Whitcomb uses for his Root-trapper fabric. Rootpouch is cheaper and it can be used in-ground while the Root-trapper is only advertised for above ground growing.
This are the ones I use.
In this article Randy Bennett suggests collecting trees 12-18' tall in order for it to have a good buttress and maybe some fluting. I look at these collected trees that are exceptional IMO, and I can't believe that were 12-18' when collected. These belong to Johng by the way.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
late Jan. into early Feb.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Can you imagine how big this one was--Guy Guidry and co. collected it a while back.
Attachments
I am not sure who Randy Bennet is but I suspect he believes that BC have to be repeatedly grown and chopped to achieve taper.... That may be true where he is or with the material he is working with but I don't know a single other BC collector that would make that recommendation unless maybe you are collecting seedlings. These tree run from between 30" to 48" and will not be be significantly chopped any more under my care. Many of these have a 12" or more root spread...cutting them off at 12-18" tall is ridiculous.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Randy Bennett is a past president of the Greater New Orleans Bonsai Society. He's been around a while. From the looks of his BC, he's not growing out and chopping trees. He looks to have plenty of collected naturally tapered stuff he's working with. He's authored a few pretty good BC 'how-to's"
Hmmm… I don’t see any of his trees…. Second photo in the first linked article is one of mine. No attribution….isn’t that nice! Several photos in the second article also appeared borrowed…
Cajunrider
Imperial Masterpiece
In the swamp BC 18 ft tall can definitely have bases that big.
It appears the phone got me and I miss read the quote… collect trees that are 12-18 feet tall is right in line… still doesn’t excuse the guy for not attributing the photos he used in his article.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Email and ask him about his trees and his classes and how long he's been doing this...(since 1970 or so) He's worked with Vaughn Banting, Guy Guidry.
This is his tree--
As is this one:
NO.bonsai.io.081322.10.jpg
A bald cypress bonsai tree grows at the home of Randy Bennett in Metairie, La.,Friday, Aug. 5, 2022. (Photo by Sophia Germer, NOLA.com, The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate)
Wow! Doesn't say much for the author of the article.
Joe Dupre'
Omono
I'm thinking....... just like you keep just the branches you need and let them grow, why not keep the roots you need (adjacent to a future buttress) and let THEM grow, hopefully thickening the buttress. A friend always kids me and says I never think "inside the box". To which I say "There's a box????"
Joe Dupre'
Omono
I've talked to Randy several times. He is the real deal. He unfortunately lost almost all of his trees in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. His current collection is very much scaled down.
I guess what I don't understand here Johng is quite a few of those trees of yours in that grouping I posted have decent buttresses and nice fluting. Also, they're obviously not huge trees because they are doing well and have plenty of room in Anderson flats. Judging by their sizes, it's hard for me to believe they were 12-18' tall when collected. Maybe you could enlighten me here. Thanks
Maiden69
Masterpiece
If you have never seen BCs in the swamps you will not understand their size. While the bottom widens significantly, these trees are growing in a semi crowded area and their only option to get big is to elongate as much as possible to reach the sun above the canopy. Look at this video by @BillsBayou where he is collecting a tree that seems slightly bigger than the biggest one on the group you posted. I think I hear Bill saying that he thinks the tree is 20 ft, but if you look at the caption he posted, the tree was nearly 40 ft tall.
This one is about the same size as some of the ones in the picture, Bill estimates it at 30 ft tall.
If you provide the right environment you could achieve the same on a seedling. Give them ample space for roots or mimic that space by constant root pruning and you can get some flare and maybe a slight buttress.
My seedling in the middle of the second season. 1.5" trunk and a little over 4" at the base of the flare.
