Raw material: potential > skill

[JoshuaRN]

So this is something I have always wanted to debate with other folks that might understand the love a tree with sooo much potential but the task and possibly end result just seems impossible.

I’m a nurse but I have co-ran a landscape design company my entire life (family) which puts me in a position to collect a really amaizing variety of trees and shrubs , a lot of which I usually just b&b and store on my back lot, but I thought I’d share a few maples that I think you guys might appreciate. As of now I have neither the skill or time to do anything about them, and the transplant was rough so a few years of rest will do them good anyhow. If anyone is wondering the trees were requested to be ripped, and I have a habit of when possible saving any great character possessing trees I can. So these guys were a spurt of the moment transplant but I couldn’t quite believe that for 50+ years my customer had been trunk chopping 4x Japanese maples (pregrafting = All seed grown) just to keep them tamed . Well here’s the photos plus a few random modern nursery maples i removed that had severe die back (plants need water ... who knew?!) and saved. Hope you enjoy,

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

So this is something I have always wanted to debate with other folks that might understand the love a tree with sooo much potential but the task and possibly end result just seems impossible.

I’m a nurse but I have co-ran a landscape design company my entire life (family) which puts me in a position to collect a really amaizing variety of trees and shrubs , a lot of which I usually just b&b and store on my back lot, but I thought I’d share a few maples that I think you guys might appreciate. As of now I have neither the skill or time to do anything about them, and the transplant was rough so a few years of rest will do them good anyhow. If anyone is wondering the trees were requested to be ripped, and I have a habit of when possible saving any great character possessing trees I can. So these guys were a spurt of the moment transplant but I couldn’t quite believe that for 50+ years my customer had been trunk chopping 4x Japanese maples (pregrafting = All seed grown) just to keep them tamed . Well here’s the photos plus a few random modern nursery maples i removed that had severe die back (plants need water ... who knew?!) and saved. Hope you enjoy,

What is the debate?
Is it that someone without skill can ruin a tree with potential?
Or that someone with skill can make a good tree out of one without potential?
I believe the former is far more likely than the latter.

 

[JoshuaRN]

What is the debate?
Is it that someone without skill can ruin a tree with potential?
Or that someone with skill can make a good tree out of one without potential?
I believe the former is far more likely than the latter.

Debate may have been the wrong word , was just a post sharing a few trees I was hired to remove and saved , but yeah the title implied that I was aknowleding restraint when presented with a tree that I do not have the skill to approach. I save trees to reuse eventually in my own garden not to always to begin training , and these are far to big for my level, and to prevent this from turning into something it’s not... I Professionally transplant trees , I’m not encouraging anyone without skill or experience to collect trees from nature.

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

I Professionally transplant trees

That’s a good way to stumble into some excellent material!

 

[jimib]

What is the debate?
Is it that someone without skill can ruin a tree with potential?
Or that someone with skill can make a good tree out of one without potential?
I believe the former is far more likely than the latter.

I am one without skill, but learning, than can ruin a tree with potential.
However a couple of weeks ago I witnessed someone with skill, knowledge and talent take my young clearance rack blue spruce and give it some character and the start to a potentially decent bonsai for my patio. I've learned a lesson on spending money on good material to start with.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Without detailed photos, I would say most of the trees you posted have some potential, maybe even great potential. If you were near by, I would be asking if they were for sale.

But you are out of my driving range for pickup.

I've ruined my share of trees. And I have turned one or two uninspired pieces of raw stock into halfway decent trees. First is more common for me.

 

[JoshuaRN]

I’d like to think one day I can confidently work on one of them but as of now they are just part of the (starting to get out of hand) collection of Japanese maples (18 at the moment not including yearlings) on the property , started as a yearly game me and my father played where he would bet that I couldn’t transfer something and keep it alive for 2 years. Starting next season I’m going to start grabbing older junipers from jobs, challenge with them is that anything 50+ that was grown as a shrub or accent usually has next to no lower buds so I have to place All Hope on one or two long branches to push some vigor into the lower trunk. But when the plant is being removed anyhow there’s no risk.
Also has anyone ever seen a tri-color beech used as bonsai? Saved a few from the junk pile last year(one of them is in the picture actually

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Yes, I've seen tricolor beech. It can be nice, since they are usually grafted, only the ones with well done grafts work. Some the graft heals to be invisible. Most have unattractive graft scars. Since the smooth gray bark is a key feature for beech, a graft scars can be a "fatal flaw".

Dwarf Mugo pines and dwarf cultivars of conifers are something you should also be on the lookout for. Again, avoid visible graft scars. Also old azalea or small leaf varieties of rhododendron.

 

[River's Edge]

I’d like to think one day I can confidently work on one of them but as of now they are just part of the (starting to get out of hand) collection of Japanese maples (18 at the moment not including yearlings) on the property , started as a yearly game me and my father played where he would bet that I couldn’t transfer something and keep it alive for 2 years. Starting next season I’m going to start grabbing older junipers from jobs, challenge with them is that anything 50+ that was grown as a shrub or accent usually has next to no lower buds so I have to place All Hope on one or two long branches to push some vigor into the lower trunk. But when the plant is being removed anyhow there’s no risk.
Also has anyone ever seen a tri-color beech used as bonsai? Saved a few from the junk pile last year(one of them is in the picture actually

Older junipers can be a great choice. Learn how to thin and cut back to push new interior growth. Most junipers respond very well if they are healthy and vigorous. If you are relocating and transplanting older specimens choose those that divide closer to the ground and have retained the most lower branching options when possible. They also air layer quite readily so those with interesting upper portions can also be a good find. Also consider that you will likely spend five years pushing back the growth to the interior. This time could be just as valuable planting younger stock in the ground or a grow box that had some root work done with selective branch pruning and then allowed to grow out for five years.

 

[Cosmos]

Here’s a random Monday morning thought about the value of trees and potential.

I see the value of trees in a bonsai context like stocks. The prices can fluctuate wildly, seemingly in a random or arbitrary manner depending on hundreds of variables. However, the value of a company’s stock is ultimately tied to the company’s business and leadership. The company’s business is like a tree’s potential. It can be good or bad, promising of not. The leadership is the bonsai practitionner. The minute a tree is bought by someone, its stock can soar or plummet.

Give a great promising startup or an established multinational corporation to an incompetent CEO, and he will screw up every time. The corporation/tree might recover, but the damage can be severe. Give a bonsai masterpiece to me, and I will screw up 100% of the time. Give a humble piece of coniferous material (startup) to Vance Wood, and he’s more likely than not to turn it into something worthwhile or even great. Give an amazing pine (big company) to AdairM, and for sure he will bring the best out of the tree.

A beginner can get help to bring out of the max of her/his good tree. Great leaders know their weaknesses and know who to turn to to compensate for help. There are tons of ways for a beginner to get help, which I think is a great part of the hobby.

 

[rockm]

So, I'm NOT trying to yank anyone's chain here. Honest,

However, most of these maples (from what I can see in the photos) are only passing in quality. Big and old doesn't always equal great potential bonsai. There are a few telephone pole trunks,
(and what looks to me like a swollen graft union) and inverse taper. Can't see the most important part of these trees--the nebari at ground level...Additionally, they look to be a pretty common variety --atropurpureum--that is mediocre when it comes to bonsai use.

A lot of the visual trunk problems can't be easily corrected, or corrected at all in some cases.

ALL of the current branching on those trunks will also have to be removed and replaced with new branching that will have to be "built," for instance.

If these were mine, I'd spend another five years at least, working the trunks in ground to heal big pruning scars, develop new branching and surface rooting.

Hopefully, you have been keeping an eye on roots. If left untended, you will wind up collecting these all over again with the resulting pruning and vigor setbacks that these underwent in their previous collection. If you keep digging these you might want to think about putting them in larger containers after collection and not back in the ground.

Like I said, not looking to yank chains, just provide some food for thought.

 

[JoshuaRN]

not even slightly at risk of yanking chains ,
i actually almost completely agree with you and value the input everyone has shared (i know plants from one perspective but you guys have a different relationship with them that reminds me to express humility), 4/5 of the 5 in the picture don't have visible signs of grafting and show the trunk texture that matches with seed grown (bonsai or not i loath grafted maples or really any grafted of the typical ornamental grafted trees i deal with)

the little guy blocking the back right tree is a ugly graft with amazing nebari that is actually eventually going to begin training once spring hits.
I have had it in a nursery pot for a few years now just to force some character out of it, making chops every other year. (advice is always welcome)
It will be my first real stab at a maple, and hopefully a good starting tree/learning experience to prepare me for the seed grown guys i have had field growing for a few years now.

As for the big guys, the low to the grown cut leaf (i apologize if i dont use exact terminology, most of experience is in nursery common names) would be borderline impossible to train for anything in the foreseeable future, and due to the root mass and giant deadwood cut i really dont know what to do with it, landscape or for anything else really...
The other 3 are just being recouped from a tough transplant and will eventually be put in raised open bottom cedar planters around the patio;from there the branch structure will be reworked, but not with bonsai training in mind... just a good place for them to provide some interest and show off their age. That being said if i ever do feel like i'm ready they'll be easily accessible , thanks for all the input guys.
...the beech is doomed for a spring time experimental fate though, 10$ into it and even as a landscape tree the canopy grew odd.