Hello,

thank you for your help. We will try the extra lighting. Do you
recommend some particular model or brand? So far, we are using my
wife's magnifying glass which has light bulb on it and can be bend to
almost any position

Regarding the soil. We bought it in nearby garden shop as bonsai soil.
The truth is it does not look like the rest of the soil in the pot. It
does resemble (on touch, look) the layer that was there before, that
is the clay pieces... As I wrote elsewhere in this thread, we draw our
information on the book "Simon & Schuster's Guide to Bonsai". Their
ideal mixture for *repotting* is 60% humus-rich soil, 10% peat and 30%
of coarse sand. Since we removed about an inch of the top layer, we
thought we'd replace it by the mixture above but its composition is
quite different. I'm getting a bit confused here...

Unfortunatelly, there's no bonsai club or dedicated garden shop where
we could bring the tree and discuss it. Anyway, we'll do our best to
keep the beautiful tree alive and prospering!

Thank you for your help

David (& Eva)

ps. Our university has shut our news server down, so I'm using
http://groups.google.com. It's tedious since my new messages and your
replies are not listed together. Could you, please, recommend me some
free usenet server? THANK YOU!




(Jim Lewis) wrote in message news:004e01c47268$0dd5d7e0$bb102cc7@pavilion...
Hello,

we haven't repotted the tree yet. But we do keep it indoors.
This is
our first bonsai and the book we bought said that it should be
kept
inside, since it is, supposedly, sensitive to draft. Also, we
don't
have garden, since we live in an appartment...

We could buy some extra light and / or open the windows more.

At least give it as MUCH light as you can. A fluorescent light
right overhead for a LONG day is about right, according to the
indoor growers on the list. Beyond that, I don't know diddly
about growing inside the house.



Another thing I forgot to mention is that we removed about a
half inch
of the soil from the top and replaced it with another one. The
reason
why we did that was that the soil was full of rotting leaves
and
flowers... Only later, we found out that the soil we purchased
doesn't
probably have the right composition. It was about 70% of fired
clay
and only about 25% of pine soil.

That sounds almost EXACTLY the right mix for bonsai. What kind
of soil was underneath? Bonsai soil wants to be large particles
and relatively small amount of organic material.

This is a good time to repot most tropicals (but let a fukien tea
expert advise you on whether it is right for one of these,
please. I'm NOT the one whose advice you want to take for
trpicals.).


I noticed that this layer probably
prevents the rest of the soil from breathing so it's possible
the we
kept that plant overwatered for a several hours.. Could that be
the
reason?

Nah. It would take more than "several hours" of wet feet to
cause a problem. Some trees just complain when fiddled with.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Bonsaiests
are like genealogists: We know our roots!

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