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As you can see, not much updating here. I have found a "bonsai album" where I can put my pictures and write down notes on my trees. So that is what I have done this summer.

Bonsai album here.

So now I save my notes in this album, and will probably not post anything more in this blog. Blogging was interesting, but mostly in the beginning!

Och alla svenskspråkiga som då och då skickar mig bonsaifrågor på epost, ni kan i stället söka upp Svenska bonsaisällskapet på facebook och ställa frågor där - ni kommer att få massor av svar, och snabbt!

Anna

Annual yamadori with the society

Yesterday was the day for the annual yamadori with the bonsai society. This year we had this fantastic weather! And this fantastic landscape!

We went to a rocky area, mostly looking for pines, as we always do - but finding a little of this and a little of that!

I love these great big old pines.

We collected all together more than 20 trees: pine, spruce, birch, aspen and juniper are represented here.

My own findings (after putting them in soil here at home today!!!): first a pine with a low branch - probably I will save only that branch and cut away the top of the tree.

A super-tiny little pine.

Finally an aspen with two trunks. Perhaps I will keep both trunks and use this as a twin-trunk, or perhaps I will just keep the left one, which is more interesting than the right one.

Putting these three in pots is the only out-door potting I have done so far this year. I really must start lifting my other bonsai from the ground and repotting soon, for the spring is coming so quickly!

PS. TV-programmet "Träden berättar" var ju inte riktigt så spännande som jag önskade att det kunde ha varit... tyckte jag. Jodå jag gillade berättelserna om de två platanerna, men innehållet skulle egentligen bara ha räckt till en kvarts kortfilm... Det kändes löjligt när man fick höra samma historia berättas om igen av en ny person, och det hände flera gånger i filmen!  

 

Bonsai Umeå 2015 - my workshop tree

I participated in the workshop with Takahiro Mori on Saturday. I had brought this pine, seen here from two different sides. It has a nice trunk with rounded curves, but an ugly root. (Very common among my trees collected from rocky areas!) At the moment it is growing almost horizontally. I have never been able to decide what to do with it.

First I was instructed to clean the tree, take away all old needles. On each tip only a small tassel of needles is left. Mori put the tree in a box to look at it more upright.

I wired the tree while Takahiro worked on the other trees.

Then he put it up in an upright position like this again. There is a straight part in the middle of the trunk which he means should look shorter if the tree is positioned so the straight part is pointing backwards rather than to the right or left.

Finally he put the branches in shape, and this is the result. A bunjin tree. The pot is standing on one side, so when I repot the tree next spring I have to put the tree in this upright position. The ugly root is supposed to be taken away. In the long term...

Picture of the tree taken in sunshine when I came home.

I will be needing one more bunjun pot!

Bonsai Umeå 2015 - exhibition

Here are some pictures from the exhibition from this past weekend. All trees belong to members of the Swedish Bonsai Society. A few of them are mine! (None of these small ones.)

I don't have a picture of every tree in the exhibition, here are only a few.

We asked Mr Mori to give suggestions for improvements. He gave many suggestions for improvements but mostly on how to display bonsai, how to choose the right accent plants and so on. Not as much on the shape of the trees.

There were many pines, it is the sort of tree that grows best in this area. And a super tree for bonsai.

... but only one ficus! That was a species that Mr Mori had never heard of. He thought this tree should have a higher stand. (I agree on that - this solution was only better than the alternatives available.)

For my twin trunk pine he suggested I should turn the tree a little, and I can agree on that too. I will do it when I repot it next year.

A rowan with nice colours to mix with all the dark conifers.

A birch, brought to Umeå by a member from the south of Sweden. I didn't bring my own birch because I thought it was too ugly at the moment.

A pomegranate and a small pine.

More pines.

And a spruce.

This was Mr Mori's favourite in the exhibition, unfortunately not my tree!

This pine is mine though. I got the feeling he wasn't very impressed by this tall and thin tree, he only said it should have a shallower pot. He can not know, of course, that I am happy it has a pot at all.

Neither was he impressed at all by the grey wood I had put under the pot. I like it very much!

Another of my pines, this one too is tall and thin (and has the same kind of old wood under the pot). I have had an idea for some time that I should take away the long branch on the left side, but I havent really dared to do it. What if somebody should say "you damaged the tree". But it would make the tree more of a proper bunjin, and the direction of the tree would be more obvious. Now Mr Mori suggested the same idea. So guess what. I did it today. I took away not only one but three branches. Now the tree looks like this:

Some wiring needed of course, but how much less it is to wire and keep in shape! 

Then I only need a round pot for it!

New pot, old tree

I have had this tree some years but not given it a proper pot. Until today!

It may not be the perfect pot, size, colour, shape etcetera, but better than the homemade concrete pot that I have used until now.

I know it is also not the perfect time for repotting, but I have only lifted the tree from the old pot and put it down in the new one. They are the same size.

(Below, the tree before repotting.)

Krukan har jag skickat efter från Bonsai & trädgård.

Pine

One pine from yamadori 2010. Yesterday I moved it from the box and into a sort of a pot! It is still not shaped in any other way than that the top is cut and the annual growth is let to grow as little as possible.

Maybe I can use it for a workshop in September, when we are having a bonsai event?

Below are the pictures from 2010:

(And here and here is what I wrote about the pine then... I can see I got a question about the height of the tree. Today the tree is 70 cm above the soil.)

...

The meaning of new pictures of same tree

 Today

 2010

 There is one reason to take pictures. To see if the bonsai changes for the better (or worse) year by year...

 I always blame the short growing season that the trees don't change very much from year to year, but of course I am aware it's not the only reason. I should really give them more attention and time and hard work. When I showed today's picture of the yew above to my son (who is not even a bonsaiist) he said "shouldn't the trunk and the start of the tree be more visible?") I must admit he is right, and maybe I will go out and do something about it. Hopefully some time this summer.

 Today

 2010

 Today

2010

More trees

I hope to have all of my trees in place soon...

Next thing to hope for is better weather...

Pine and pine

Nature is a good inspiration for bonsai! This is a pine I have taken up from the winter storing place today (in the rain). I shaped it last summer.

And this is a large (and dead) pine I walked by in the forest some days ago.

Look at the branches - I think they have some similarities!

A day out

On Saturday I went out with the Bonsai society for yamadori. We do it every year in May, we have made it into a tradition! This year we took the chance to walk over an area where there are plans to make a ski slope (easy to get permission to dig up trees there). The view is over the lake Tavelsjön.

It looks a little like somebody has left garbage bags in nature... but this is instead our findings, with their roots wrapped in plastic bags! There are mostly pines, but also one spruce (to the left) and I know one birch was also found, but it's not in the photo.

I took this pine. Not very big, not very spectacular...

And when I came home and had to take out soil and tools and pots -  my hands already dirty -  I decided to dig up two trees from the ground and put them in their pots. The first for this year. Two salix.