I have read in a bonsai book that hitting the trunk of a pine
with a hammer, softly will cause cell damage and as the tree
repairs this damage the diameter of the trunk is increased. The
book continued to say that one should only do one side of a tree
at a time.

snip

============

What book? I want to NOT buy it.

There aren't any shortcuts. Really. You can poke the bark with
a sharp knife or a needle, scour it with sandpaper, wrap it
tightly with string, or whap it with a hammer and you _may_ get a
slightly fatter trunk, but you're likely to get an UGLY fatter
trunk, too.

Trees don't say "Ouch! You're hitting me too hard." So you may
also end up with a severely damaged tree.

Part of bonsai is the care you take in developing a tree slowly
so it reaches its potential.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - The phrase
'sustainable growth' is an oxymoron. - Stephen Viederman

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