Waltron
Chumono
it is growing on the edge of a river bank, it does have a nice root flare.. wasnt seriously thinking of collecting it, but it may happen.
is medusa clump a style? found a crab apple with about 10 little trunks.
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it is growing on the edge of a river bank, it does have a nice root flare.. wasnt seriously thinking of collecting it, but it may happen.
Waltron
Chumono
this particular area is a great place.. i go there to take it easy and walk around and study trees and animal sign. there are crab apples trees that offer decent potential that I probably wont collect. and there are giants that are un collectable. and there are 3 different zones to this 30 acre area where different tree eco systems grow, not including the forest. the forest edge, which is a maple beech, has white birch and hornbeam, tilia, sycamore.. the middle area offers the crabs and pear and buckthorn.. then the other 1/3rd has aspen and cotton wood that are stunted because the ground is like a weird lichen sand.. too bad black cherry isint very desirable.. some world class bonsai black cherry out there, buckthorn too.
Waltron
Chumono
heres some neat photos off my trail cam. looks like that ninja squirrel is about to come thru with a cartwheel kick on that rooster. throw a bucket of acorns down and you will get some wildlife photos pretty quick. I dont hunt off a bait pile, fwiw.
the first one is of a larger coyote I
actually hit with an arrow in bow season, made a bad shot.. he got away. if you look at the top of his back you'll see a lump. found the corpse of one of the pheasants the other day.. and 2 deer. damn yotes.
the first one is of a larger coyote I actually hit with an arrow in bow season, made a bad shot.. he got away. if you look at the top of his back you'll see a lump. found the corpse of one of the pheasants the other day.. and 2 deer. damn yotes.
just.wing.it
Deadwood Head
Where's the squatch pics?
Waltron
Chumono
I keep those private for personal reasons.
CWTurner
Omono
Sounds lovely. Lucky you!
CW
Leo in N E Illinois
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I've been quoting ''rules'' for designing bonsai - which is dishonest of me. I should preface that with two points.
1.) is there a unique feature of the material in front of you that is its strength, that you want to preserve and show off? If so, all design efforts should include use of this feature. Be it an interesting bend or twist to the trunk, a neat root arrangement, rough bark, what ever the feature is, before invoking rules, you first have to decide what is unique and interesting about the tree in front of you and design around that. If it is a bend or twist, design for branching that doesn't exist yet should compliment the feature. I try to always ask myself this question, before I start on any piece of material.
2.) the ''rules'' really are for those times when there is no obvious plan for what to do next. Or for when the tree ''doesn't look right'', then the rules are are really useful. There are really no "Rules", the design rules are for when you don't know what to do, or for when the proportions just don't create the image you want. A lot of collected material and some that is entirely nursery grown do not follow ''the rules'', and yet look quite acceptable to excellent. Rules are just for when it is not obvious what to do. Useful to solve proportion problems. But if the effect of the tree actually in front of you is one that you like, you don't need to fall back on the rules. Work with the strengths of the material in front of you.
If you follow the rules, with a boring stick in a pot, in time you will have a pleasant bonsai, though some will look at it and yawn, because it will be a ''formula'' tree. But it will work. Now if you find material with character, your only need of the rules will be to help frame and show off the traits that have the character.
Leo in N E Illinois
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@Waltron - The family blueberry farm (cousins including myself as a minority partner) is in Van Buren County, about 9 miles east of South Haven, and 15 miles west of Paw Paw or 25 miles west of Kalamazoo. We should meet up sometime, I'm on the farm 3 to 4 days a week, usually week days. I think you are pretty close to the farm. PM me if you'd like to meet up. That goes for all Michigan BNuts, if you want to meet up, I'm fairly gregarious. Love bullshitting about bonsai, it is more fun than the routine tasks around the blueberry patch. Though I love the ''farming life'', compared to my original day job in a windowless lab for 35 years. I now have a collection of pre-bonsai I house at the farm, with my more developed stuff at my home in northern Illinois. The farm is more woods than farm - roughly 50 acres of woods, only 25 acres of fields. Lots of tree species, and a crap load of volunteer elms in the fields that need to be removed.
Your trail cam photos, and trees for possible collection photos all look like similar habitat to what the farm has. Instead of pheasant, we have turkeys but otherwise the line up is similar. Really nice.
On the farm I've got a different line up of trees, but not wildly different. The family group only bought the farm about a year ago, so I haven't had time to dig much. One area is beech, maple, & hornbeam with witch hazel, pawpaw and lindera as understory. In the fields, weed trees of Elaeagnus (autumn olive) elm, red oak, juniper virginiana, sumac & sassafras with the occasional hackberry. Another area has one of the birches, either black or sweet, but I'm not sure which, plus catberry or mountain holly(Ilex mucronata) , and poison sumac, higher up the hill there are Liriodendron (tulip poplar). also nearby, hickories of some sort (not shagbark, maybe bitternut hickory) also red pine - Pinus resinosa the MI native pine. Soil throughout is sandy and deep, meaning most trees that normally develop tap roots are too difficult to collect, but younger trees, and species without tap roots are easy to dig. So as time permits I've been scouting new trees to dig, but alas, haven't had as much time for that as I would like.
Your trail cam photos, and trees for possible collection photos all look like similar habitat to what the farm has. Instead of pheasant, we have turkeys but otherwise the line up is similar. Really nice.
On the farm I've got a different line up of trees, but not wildly different. The family group only bought the farm about a year ago, so I haven't had time to dig much. One area is beech, maple, & hornbeam with witch hazel, pawpaw and lindera as understory. In the fields, weed trees of Elaeagnus (autumn olive) elm, red oak, juniper virginiana, sumac & sassafras with the occasional hackberry. Another area has one of the birches, either black or sweet, but I'm not sure which, plus catberry or mountain holly(Ilex mucronata) , and poison sumac, higher up the hill there are Liriodendron (tulip poplar). also nearby, hickories of some sort (not shagbark, maybe bitternut hickory) also red pine - Pinus resinosa the MI native pine. Soil throughout is sandy and deep, meaning most trees that normally develop tap roots are too difficult to collect, but younger trees, and species without tap roots are easy to dig. So as time permits I've been scouting new trees to dig, but alas, haven't had as much time for that as I would like.
Waltron
Chumono
i want a blue berry bonsai, how about those?
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Waltron
Chumono
You keep those in your "spank-bank" do ya?...
nah locked in my basement.
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@Waltron
You have a lot of nice possibilities there... I'll add one thing to what CWT said, I've run across many many nice looking trees (above ground) that only have half the desirable root system. Depending on the species, it might be worthwhile to take two, grind the rootless sides flat and mate the cambium up, then screw them together... "If" they fuse, you might double the appeal, but of course, this only works if you want a multi-trunk... and they might be much too large once you do this...
Also, with that elm... if the farmer isn't going to mess with it anymore, I'd leave it there for a few seasons to recover and see how it naturally developed... what looks unappealing now, might become highly desirable in a few short seasons.
You have a lot of nice possibilities there... I'll add one thing to what CWT said, I've run across many many nice looking trees (above ground) that only have half the desirable root system. Depending on the species, it might be worthwhile to take two, grind the rootless sides flat and mate the cambium up, then screw them together... "If" they fuse, you might double the appeal, but of course, this only works if you want a multi-trunk... and they might be much too large once you do this...
Also, with that elm... if the farmer isn't going to mess with it anymore, I'd leave it there for a few seasons to recover and see how it naturally developed... what looks unappealing now, might become highly desirable in a few short seasons.
Waltron
Chumono
haha now that's an idea! I've got too many much more appealing candidates to mess with that elm anyway, had a busy weekend diggin some hornbeam's. I'll be busy with crabs in spring so I figured i'd get my hornbeam obsession out of the way in the "January thaw"
Waltron
Chumono
im not sure, but it seems like the could be a style.. maybe shorten it down to about 10" height, get rid of straight sectrions.. throw it in pot?
came across this photo, i guess this is the "style" I had in mind, obviously its a long way off.. something to shoot for though I guess.
Potawatomi13
Imperial Masterpiece
YES! Largely unused tree very interesting. Probably should be larger tree due to leaves and flowersliterati tulip poplar anyone? lol
.Potawatomi13
Imperial Masterpiece
Frankly way too busy. Multi trunks OK but busyness of excess branches on many flowering Quince and little visible structure not attractive
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defra
Masterpiece
Any of this trees got digged up ?
Just curious!
Just curious!
JudyB
Queen of the Nuts
me too, esp about the crabs...
Waltron
Chumono
yep pretty much most of them have been collected. They have all put out quite a bit of new growth, coming into the summer stall right now, not too much to look at, pretty leggy recovery growth, however I do have a good vision for pretty much all of them, though, it will be a process. ill take some photos and post em up here eventually.. Collected a really nice jack pine and birch lake shore dune yamadori im babying right now. headed north to search and potentially collect another jack pine soon. and hopefully locate the evasive bog larch for late summer collection.
Waltron
Chumono
the title tree, funny enough, while currently still does look medusa-ish, im thinking will most likely be reduced to a twin trunk actually. The hawthorn I chopped and left in situ, it has put out great new growth, I will collect it in a year or two. those are actually a tricky or difficult species to collect, so im taking it cautious with that one.
