If dwarf conifers are accepted as bonsai, then why not dwarf palms or
bamboos? In my opinion using a dwarf plant minimizes the
accomplishment of dwarfing or miniaturizing a plant which is at the
heart of the art and science of bonsai.

I agree that people often transplant stunted plants from nature to
make a bonsai. That doesn't make it desirable. In my opinion, it is a
type of cheating to merely take stunted plants from nature for use as
bonsai. It's sort of like faux topiary, with English ivy or other vine
grown on wire frames, which does not require the skill or patience of
real topiary. It's also undesirable because more wild specimens are
lost.

Are there clear historical records that say ancient bonsai growers
preferred to gather stunted plants from the wild? Or was that a short
cut method?

A lot of botanists work for the government. Even if that makes them
"bureaucrats", it doesn't mean they stop being botanists. Webster's
Dictionary usually reflects common use of words and they say banana
can be defined as a tree.

If you allow that a "palm has a somewhat woody trunk" then you could
extend that to bananas or bamboo as well. It depends how you define
wood. Plant anatomist Katherine Esau defined wood as

"Usually secondary xylem of gymnosperms and dicotyledons, but also
applied to any other xylem."

Monocots such as banana trees and bamboo also have xylem. Most
monocots do not have the secondary growth that produces wood in
gymnosperms and dicots. Palms develop the full width of their trunk
during primary growth. Some monocot stems get wider as they get taller
because the lower portions cannot expand with secondary growth. Screw
pine (Pandanus spp.) develops prop roots to support such top-heavy
stems.

Bamboo stems are often called woody so that makes tall bamboos fit the
definition of a tree:
http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/carr/po.htm

David R. Hershey





(Iris Cohen) wrote in message ...
A lot of dwarf conifers are used in bonsai. I guess some bonsai purists
might consider that "cheating" too.

Not lately. It is a common practice, even in Japan.

I read an article in Smithsonian magazine a few years ago about people who
would collect severely stunted trees from the wild and use those in bonsai.
That might be considered cheating as well.

Not at all. That is the way bonsai first started. There are specialists who do
nothing but collect prize trees, establish them in pots, & sell them at high
prices. The ambition of every salivating bonsai artist is to have at least one
collected tree, preferably one he's collected himself.

Many people do consider a large banana plant to be a tree, including the
USDA Forest Service:

Are they botanists or government bureaucrats?

The state tree of South Carolina is the palmetto (Sabal palmetto), which is
a monocot.

Palms have a somewhat woody trunk, although the various conducting cells are
arranged differently.

Tall bamboos are often referred to as trees also.

By whom?

Iris,
Central NY, Zone 5a, Sunset Zone 40
"The trouble with people is not that they don't know but that they know so much
that ain't so."
Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw), 1818-1885