Dadayama
Sapling
I was searching the archives and was surprised that this question has not come up...
What is the difference between a potted tree and a bonsai
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Mikecheck123
Omono
Bonsai is a verb in which you perform certain techniques to make a tree look miniature and old.
A tree in a pot hasn't been the subject of that process.
A tree in a pot hasn't been the subject of that process.
caffeinated
Mame
Agreeing with the above, a bonsai tree would typically, but not always, look like a mature or ancient tree with some aesthetics added to whatever the tree gives you to work with. The potted tree in a landscape or on your front porch, is just a young looking tree growing every which way in a pot, sometimes with some pruning but often to a more topiary aesthetic. You often see people arguing that the translation of the name of the art-form is what that art-form must be, which is kind of silly. Anyone walking around with an "empty hand" is not performing karate. A tree in a pot is not necessarily a bonsai. There is more meaning to any art-form than the literal definition or translation of the name.
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rockm
Spuds Moyogi
A bonsai is a potted tree that is grown using artistic and horticultural techniques in pursuit of an artistic image for the viewer. They are grown with intent. Intent other than simple foliage. A potted plant is a potted plant.
Better question that has been asked is "what's the difference between bonsai and topiary?" The short answer is --topiary is simply pruning. Bonsai is deeper and more intensive in pursuit of a more profound image.
MaciekA
Shohin
The way I think about it is you have a bucket of techniques that are collectively known bonsai techniques. Throw all bonsai-only techniques in there. Root ramification. Partial defoliation. Canopy ramification techniques. Decandling. Wiring branches up or down. etc.
Species Suitability: The more a given species of plant responds as hoped to techniques chosen from the bonsai bucket, the more we tend to say that species will work for bonsai. Disagreements happen at the fringes like with something that can wire up beautifully, but (say) doesn’t bifurcate at all.
Individual Trees: The more a given individual plant standing before us has actually had intentional actions taken to turn it into a bonsai by a human who selects techniques from the bonsai bucket, the more it tends to actually become a bonsai and earns a higher consensus from bonsai observers that it is either a bonsai or has begun to check some checkboxes. The consensus tends to be highest for trees whose bonsai characteristics begin to develop Japanese bonsai aesthetics in particular: For example, in pine, if branches are managed and wired into binary fans that form logical pads and asymmetrical cloud-like domes using those binary fans, we are more likely to say “that looks like a Japanese pine bonsai”. The classification as a bonsai is much less ambiguous and there’s less disagreement over what we’re looking at.
A tree begins to revert or regress from bonsai if left to its own devices. For example, let’s leave a mature, rough-barked white pine bonsai out in the middle of a regularly-watered field. The roots escape, shatter the pot, and a full size tree muscles its way out of the shohin pot and eventually grows into a 30ft tall adolescent tree with young-looking smooth bark. It un-bonsai’d itself and even lost some of the apparent age granted through techniques. The same might happen to people’s neglected bonsai or under-developed material they’ve waffled on for years.
Under my definition, Nature’s own attempts at bonsai lack coordinated intent so they tend to only “present as bonsai” to surface-level assessments from both noobs and experts, but sometimes nature can check several boxes — lowering of branches, aggressive canopy erosion, extreme constraint of roots can all happen in a single wild tree. Rarely though, if ever, does nature lay down binary fans that form logical pads and “clouds” in the Japanese cultural sense. Nature didn’t read the Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting, either.
In my opinion, an artist pushes a tree along a bonsai spectrum, and different observers in the global bonsai community have different ideas of where the threshold lies along that spectrum due to cultural or personal biases.
For example, I recognize Gilbert Cantu’s work with portulacaria as bonsai because the techniques produce binary fans, graceful asymmetry, feature reduction through ramification. The intent, techniques, species response, and dare I say consensus is there. He won’t earn as much widespread consensus as Shinji Suzuki but he’s up there. My teacher often reminds students that in Japan there are many who do not group satsuki azalea in with bonsai. To them it’s something else entirely.
I don’t consider most potted trees that I believe OP is asking about to be bonsai — whether it is a citrus/ficus/hibiscus sitting in grandma’s living room for the last 35 years, or an alberta spruce in a 5 gallon pot, or a chamaecyparis in a fist-sized pot with an Iseli “perfect for bonsai!” tag attached to it. They are rammed right up against the left edge of the spectrum and earn a low consensus for “it’s a bonsai”, especially as the room crowds up with bonsai people as opposed to the general population.
Species Suitability: The more a given species of plant responds as hoped to techniques chosen from the bonsai bucket, the more we tend to say that species will work for bonsai. Disagreements happen at the fringes like with something that can wire up beautifully, but (say) doesn’t bifurcate at all.
Individual Trees: The more a given individual plant standing before us has actually had intentional actions taken to turn it into a bonsai by a human who selects techniques from the bonsai bucket, the more it tends to actually become a bonsai and earns a higher consensus from bonsai observers that it is either a bonsai or has begun to check some checkboxes. The consensus tends to be highest for trees whose bonsai characteristics begin to develop Japanese bonsai aesthetics in particular: For example, in pine, if branches are managed and wired into binary fans that form logical pads and asymmetrical cloud-like domes using those binary fans, we are more likely to say “that looks like a Japanese pine bonsai”. The classification as a bonsai is much less ambiguous and there’s less disagreement over what we’re looking at.
A tree begins to revert or regress from bonsai if left to its own devices. For example, let’s leave a mature, rough-barked white pine bonsai out in the middle of a regularly-watered field. The roots escape, shatter the pot, and a full size tree muscles its way out of the shohin pot and eventually grows into a 30ft tall adolescent tree with young-looking smooth bark. It un-bonsai’d itself and even lost some of the apparent age granted through techniques. The same might happen to people’s neglected bonsai or under-developed material they’ve waffled on for years.
Under my definition, Nature’s own attempts at bonsai lack coordinated intent so they tend to only “present as bonsai” to surface-level assessments from both noobs and experts, but sometimes nature can check several boxes — lowering of branches, aggressive canopy erosion, extreme constraint of roots can all happen in a single wild tree. Rarely though, if ever, does nature lay down binary fans that form logical pads and “clouds” in the Japanese cultural sense. Nature didn’t read the Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting, either.
In my opinion, an artist pushes a tree along a bonsai spectrum, and different observers in the global bonsai community have different ideas of where the threshold lies along that spectrum due to cultural or personal biases.
For example, I recognize Gilbert Cantu’s work with portulacaria as bonsai because the techniques produce binary fans, graceful asymmetry, feature reduction through ramification. The intent, techniques, species response, and dare I say consensus is there. He won’t earn as much widespread consensus as Shinji Suzuki but he’s up there. My teacher often reminds students that in Japan there are many who do not group satsuki azalea in with bonsai. To them it’s something else entirely.
I don’t consider most potted trees that I believe OP is asking about to be bonsai — whether it is a citrus/ficus/hibiscus sitting in grandma’s living room for the last 35 years, or an alberta spruce in a 5 gallon pot, or a chamaecyparis in a fist-sized pot with an Iseli “perfect for bonsai!” tag attached to it. They are rammed right up against the left edge of the spectrum and earn a low consensus for “it’s a bonsai”, especially as the room crowds up with bonsai people as opposed to the general population.
Dadayama
Sapling
Hello everyone
Thank you for all the answers and especially MaciekA for the in-depth analysis.
It is interesting how so many of the answers steered towards a scientific or dictionary response. The direct response is in no way bad it is just that I meant to ask the question with a more philosophical approach. That was my fault for not reflecting my intent very well.
What prompted my question is I often see on the "net" or at commercial plant establishments trees that appear to my sapling eyes, as simply young trees stuck in pots.
Here is an example of what I mentioned above. To my patron of bonsai eyes (as opposed to bonsai practitioner) this looks like a baby tree with wire attached and bent whimsically.
Is this image bonsai or not? It is being sold online as bonsai and I wouldn't want to take the enjoyment away from one who purchases this tree. But, mentally I have a hard time excepting this as bonsai and more as something sold to resemble bonsai.
Am I a bad person for thinking this way?
Thank you for all the answers and especially MaciekA for the in-depth analysis.
It is interesting how so many of the answers steered towards a scientific or dictionary response. The direct response is in no way bad it is just that I meant to ask the question with a more philosophical approach. That was my fault for not reflecting my intent very well.
What prompted my question is I often see on the "net" or at commercial plant establishments trees that appear to my sapling eyes, as simply young trees stuck in pots.
Here is an example of what I mentioned above. To my patron of bonsai eyes (as opposed to bonsai practitioner) this looks like a baby tree with wire attached and bent whimsically.
Is this image bonsai or not? It is being sold online as bonsai and I wouldn't want to take the enjoyment away from one who purchases this tree. But, mentally I have a hard time excepting this as bonsai and more as something sold to resemble bonsai.
Am I a bad person for thinking this way?
Dav4
Drop Branch Murphy
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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, meaning that if you feel good calling that procumbens whip a bonsai, then it's fine... and technically, it's accurate. With that being said, the vast majority of bonsai enthusiasts would balk at calling that a 'good' bonsai. In fact, the image you've provided has colloquially been labeled a 'mallsai'- cheap bonsai mass produced to be sold to the masses who don't know any better. A 'mallsai' was actually my first bonsai, a Christmas gift over half a life time ago,
PaulH
Omono
I don't know why this irritates me so much... but... BONSAI IS NOT A VERB!
Dadayama
Sapling
MaciekA
Shohin
If you are a "patron of bonsai" as opposed to an active practitioner, then from your point of view, this may not be a bonsai, especially if your bookshelf is all Kokufu archives and your main window into bonsai is high-level artists on the global scene. This tree (and this forum, really) is more like behind the scenes. It's a starter tree.
If you are shopping for trees as a patron who does not intend to practice, then you could be shopping in the wrong place, because patrons who do not practice might not be happy with starter trees unless they intend to become practitioners themselves, or plan to pay a practitioner to work on them. Bonsai trees are built with techniques and are not self-emergent. Cheap starter trees are for practitioners who are interested in transforming these intermediate forms into bonsai. Trees start out as coarse, unrefined, primitively-structured sticks in pots. All trees start out somewhere.
This forum is probably mostly practitioners. Experienced practitioners are known for their ability to glance at a tree, evaluate how far it is into the bonsai timeline, and then present a plan to "make progress on the bonsai timeline". Every tree is progressing along that line.
This ability to see the future tree in raw or coarse material is a skill that Brent Walston (famous pre-bonsai grower) mentioned was one of the most important skills for a bonsai practitioner to have. This is not necessarily a skill that non-practicing patrons/admirers of bonsai learn, because it's mostly a skill you pick up by working on a lot of trees.
Consider the tree you've linked as somewhere early in the timeline. Forget the potting soil and other mallsai characteristics for a moment -- it's a tree that has had trunk wiring done (with an opening for an apex and a downward leader, even), potting into a bonsai pot done, trunk angle movement established, front chosen. I could turn this into a competent tree over the years. If, as a non-practicing patron of bonsai, it doesn't meet your minimum threshold for bonsai, then it's not valuable to you.
So here's the thing: When you do not practice, it is hard to see the value of a whip with a single bend in it. While I wouldn't personally buy a potting-soil mallsai tree from an online retailer, I do source many trees that are equally uninteresting or unsatisfying in their appearance and do not look anything like bonsai to the untrained eye. But this is how you start out as a practitioner and chart a path. Almost every practitioner on this forum has plenty of sticks in pots that they call "bonsai" to their bonsai friends and nobody bats an eye. Some even in potting soil. Some even in cheap $5 pots. Some even with a whimsical ("initial trunkline") bend.
It would probably be foolish for an online retailer to avoid using the word "bonsai" when describing trees like the one you linked, because that tree is several steps into the development timeline -- selling trees is one of the hardest businesses to be in and even if you want to sell 10/10 show-winners, you have to pay the bills by selling starter material. Search archive dot org for the artofbonsai forum interview with Brent Walston and you can read him talking about exactly this challenge.
Dadayama
Sapling
I still think this is a good question to ask and to think about.
Bjorn posted this recently... not exactly the same subject but related.
Bjorn posted this recently... not exactly the same subject but related.
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