SeanS
Omono
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Is bonsai going to grow or decline in popularity?
- Thread starter Njyamadori
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rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Gotta love the lack of perspective...Bonsai has grown exponentially in the last 20-30 years. It's not apparent to those who haven't been doing bonsai for more than 10 years, but compared to where we were in the 1970's and 1980's bonsai has become WILDLY popular. We are currently in what might be called the Golden Age of bonsai in the west... Japanese informed instructors, availability of good to excellent material (including pots from Japan, as well as a growing number of western bonsai potters--which are now listed in long directories--you could count bonsai potters in the early 90's on one hand). Bonsai is on the decline in Japan, as the primary audience there is dying off. That slack is being taken up in the west. That was the prediction a very long time ago by many top bonsai practitioners there...
It's not some bubble. It's sustained, expanding interest. Internet is mostly responsible for that. Most of the initial guesswork getting into bonsai thirty or forty years ago is gone, replaced by (mostly) wide availability of good to excellent knowledge and resources. Sure there's a lot of junk around, but if you're willing to only a bit of research, you can be in a pretty good place in half the time it used to take to become knowledgeable and capable.
No, bonsai isn't going to become an everyday thing for most people, since it requires patience and constant care, but it keeps expanding and will continue to do so. It has an appeal that is deeply connected to nature and the wild, which is becoming more scarce for an increasingly urbanized world.
www.architecturaldigest.com
www.architecturaldigest.com
It's not some bubble. It's sustained, expanding interest. Internet is mostly responsible for that. Most of the initial guesswork getting into bonsai thirty or forty years ago is gone, replaced by (mostly) wide availability of good to excellent knowledge and resources. Sure there's a lot of junk around, but if you're willing to only a bit of research, you can be in a pretty good place in half the time it used to take to become knowledgeable and capable.
No, bonsai isn't going to become an everyday thing for most people, since it requires patience and constant care, but it keeps expanding and will continue to do so. It has an appeal that is deeply connected to nature and the wild, which is becoming more scarce for an increasingly urbanized world.
Meet the Brad Pitt of Bonsai
The Tennessee-born Bjorn Bjorholm travels to Japan to pursue his love of bonsai
Meet the Man Who Grows Mini Million-Dollar Trees
Having honed his bonsai skills under a master in Japan, American Ryan Neil has taken his practice Stateside to wild (and lucrative) acclaim
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rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Were the permits specifically for bonsai, or for something more general? I know that eastern National Forests have been dealing with runs on collecting permits for Ginseng, mushrooms, berries, etc. Landscapers are also interested in collecting trees that will bring top dollar, as well...
colley614
Shohin
I'm fairly new to it all. The one thing that stood out for me is the average age of everyone. I would love to see younger members as most people I see seem to be 40+
Shogun610
Masterpiece
Quite the contrary
KikurageOtomo
Shohin
Possible I'm mistaken, but to my knowledge the permit papers for foraging are distinctive from the tags issued to gather "lumber" in most states. Of course this varies incredibly state to state, so the only way to be sure is to contact the DNR or other regulatory authority.
Crazy Diamond
Omono
The Brad Pitt of bonsai... hahahaha
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
It works like this.
There is no nursery where they raise quaking aspen. They take over to quickly when in the ground, and don't do well in nursery cans, so a big nursery might have better luck hiring people to collect saplings from the wild.
A big name nation wide nursery company doesn't want to deal with the legal hassle of getting a business permit for 4000 trees- there's the EPA, conservation groups, regulations out the wazoo- so they pick an employee, have him set up a personal bank account, then give him a loan of $200k or something. He goes and buy's 4k personal use permits because there's no limits on how many a private individual can get, and no obligations of private citizens to the EPA or whatnot.
The guy then gives those permits 50 or 100 at a time to someone he's hired to dig trees for him. That dude takes his buddies into the woods, digs 100 trees in a weekend, makes one or two grand in one go. Those trees are then take by our first guy and transferred to the big name nation wide nursery corporation at cost, who then sells you aspens for landscaping at 400% markup.
I use aspens as an example, but I'm certain there's dozens of species this happens with. It's a known practice. If there's a variety of wild tree or shrub you bought at a garden center in the US, decent chance this is how it got there. I just didn't realize it had become so prevalent around here.
In Nevada it got bad because culinary companies did it with five needle piñon pine nuts. They're the most prized pine nut variety in the world, and piñons don't cultivate on farms and orchards so well. There they finally put limits on how many permits could just be bought, then the rest are doled out via lottery to ACTUAL private individuals.
There was a show at one time on the History Channel about people hunting alligators. The folks on screen paralleled the tree diggers in my aspen example.
Shogun610
Masterpiece
“On first glance, Ryan Neil doesn’t appear to fit the mold of a bonsai master. He’s young, American, and buff, with the boyish good looks of a Tom Brady. But appearances can be deceiving”
Hahah what ?
Hahah what ?
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
These came in as I was writing my last post.
Forest service has a list of stuff you can do without permits, then the rest need various different permits with different rules.
There's no permitting specific to bonsai, just a live tree/shrub transplant permit.
@rockm, this is exactly what's going on. Most places have caught on and enacted measures to mitigate this, but it's apparently not happened here yet.
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
Oh, and keep in mind this is the national forest service. I'm calling bureau of land management ( the OG BLM 
) today to see how they're doing it. Forest service is USDA, BLM is department of the interior.
) today to see how they're doing it. Forest service is USDA, BLM is department of the interior.colley614
Shohin
I'm talking from what I've seen within my area at clubs etc.
ghues
Omono
It seems that in many parts it’s increasing.......however another perspective from a small community perspective it’s stable at best....we started our club back in 2008 and Membership quickly jumped to a whopping 20 members.....fast forward to 2022 barely 20. Many original members have moved on to other interests, others still have trees but aren’t interested in the club, new members come and go frequently. Of the original 20 there are only 5 of us.
As my wife keeps asking me “why are you still growing sticks in pots and what are you going to do with all of them?” Lol.
As my wife keeps asking me “why are you still growing sticks in pots and what are you going to do with all of them?” Lol.
Leo in N E Illinois
The Professor
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Looking around the internets, over the last 20 years, bonsai has grown, hugely. @rockm is right. My local club, not so much. My club, the Milwaukee Bonsai Society is quite active, and is even hosting a MABA, but our membership tends to be "steady state", mostly well over 40 years.
I look at the young people I know, I don't see them getting interested in bonsai. When I have to give up the hobby, I'm afraid my trees are going to go to an old fart as old as I am.
That might not be entirely true, but there are very few under 65 in our club.
I look at the young people I know, I don't see them getting interested in bonsai. When I have to give up the hobby, I'm afraid my trees are going to go to an old fart as old as I am.
That might not be entirely true, but there are very few under 65 in our club.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
The thing about judging bonsai by the age of club participants and those who are far along their bonsai journey is misleading. Bonsai lends itself to being settled, living in your own house with a backyard, etc. That means most successful bonsaists tend to be older than 30...It is something that younger people tend to get into enthusiastically, but discover they can't really keep the bonsai they want because they're in apartments and moving around with jobs and social groups.
I did that. I fell in love with bonsai in my late twenties when I saw the trees at the National Arboretum. I went out and bought the requisite juniper/ficus/serissa--which I killed indoors.
After that, I stepped away, because I discovered it was mostly impossible to keep good bonsai inside an apartment. A few years later, I bought a house with a backyard. that move allowed me to jump in with both feet.
It's a similar progression for many here too, I've noticed.
I did that. I fell in love with bonsai in my late twenties when I saw the trees at the National Arboretum. I went out and bought the requisite juniper/ficus/serissa--which I killed indoors.
After that, I stepped away, because I discovered it was mostly impossible to keep good bonsai inside an apartment. A few years later, I bought a house with a backyard. that move allowed me to jump in with both feet.
It's a similar progression for many here too, I've noticed.
badatusernames
Omono
It's definitely visible to newcomers, or at least ones who look. Even just using akadama still has some doubts around it with some of the older folks, it seems - one told me I was being scammed, essentially. I don't know how it's ebbed and flowed over time, but I definitely have had a sense that I was joining during an inflection point. I bought a Chinese quince last week and the guy rattled off a bunch of information that runs counter to literally everything any modern resource has to say about them - I know those are kind of unique in their own way in particular, but a) I don't necessarily doubt the person's advice however b) it appears there may be better advice out there now, you just need to collect and collate and cross-reference in yourself rather than being reliant on whichever one person wrote the book or ran the nursery.
bwaynef
Masterpiece
Its interesting that you reference 20-30 years, then talk about 1970 and '80 ....as if they were 20-30 years ago.
Your point stands though.
rockm
Spuds Moyogi
Yeah, they seem like yesterday, even though it's been a lot longer...Its interesting that you reference 20-30 years, then talk about 1970 and '80 ....as if they were 20-30 years ago.
Your point stands though.
ShadyStump
Imperial Masterpiece
This, exactly this.We joke about the 40 or 50 year old buying their dream sports car having a midlife crisis, but really they've just finally gotten to a point in their career where they can afford what they always wanted.
Bonsai is a hobby/practice that often requires stability and setting down our own roots.
That said, at work I have high school students showing interest, and we're learning, and experimenting, and finding ways to keep plants and trees in unlikely places in unlikely ways. Once our projects really get rolling, I suspect some of them will find ways to keep it with them. Maybe not traditional ways, or anything we might expect, but that's the nature of youth and of evolution, and I'm all for it.
My hope is that one day, maybe a decade from now, a familiar face will show up on BNut saying, "I've been lugging around this tree since high school, and I finally want to do some REAL work with it. Thoughts?"
roberthu
Chumono
For something that takes this much time and effort, requires serious dedication with uncertain outcome sometimes, I don't think it will get very popular. Certain small group will commit to it and that's about it. Most people just join and leave in several month or a year.
