Steve, Alan is right. In our areas (yours and mine) Yaupon (Ilex vomitoria)
is hedge material. That means you can cut it back as hard as you want.
There is usually enough salvage material available in my area so I can be
picky. I don't look twice at material which does not have substantial trunk
development for the first 5"-6" above the ground. Then I throw away
everything above that which doesn't look as if it may lend itself to bonsai.
If you can leave it in the ground for a year after this cutback, so much the
better. Leaving a little green on it is nice but it will break back on very
old wood, especially if in strong light.

Collect in late winter, plant in a growing pot (I use a barrel bottom) using
very course material (perlite is my material of choice) and some organic
material (ground up bark or similar) and let it grow wild for a while. If
it recovers like most, you may start pruning and trimming on it later in the
year (they need to be trimmed several times annually when a hedge). The
next spring you can probably move it into a training (oversized bonsai) pot
and start serious work.

Jay Beckenbach - Melrose, FL - Zone 8b/9a -


-----Original Message-----
From: Alan Walker ]
Sent: Thursday, December 09, 2004 7:54 PM
Subject: Large Bonsai question


Steve: You don't need to do this with yaupon holly. You can find
shorter specimens with fat trunks, because they tend to grow as a
bush rather than a tree.

Alan Walker
http://bonsai-bci.com http://LCBSBonsai.org


-----Original Message-----
From: Steve

Ok, Do you think it will work for the Yaupon's too?
Steve

"Alan Walker" wrote ...
---------- CLIP ----------
but elms are good at backbudding and will provide you with new
branches to develop in no time.
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