I'm curious as to what other people have planted bonsai in besides regular
pots. For instance, I've got a few pre-bonsais growing in a shot glass, a
mug, a dog dish (plastic with holes drilled in the bottom), and a whelk
shell (it's cracked so it drains well). A few days ago a friend of mine and
I were eating lunch at a mexican restaurant and I remarked that the salsa
bowls would be cool bonsai pots... later that same and I was at the dollar
store and lo and behold I found a twin pack of similar dishes! Conned said
friend into drilling holes in the bottoms (by giving him two) and viola...
bonsai pots! What else have you guys and gals used over the years to either
grow out cuttings or put bonsai in? I love the "off the wall" stuff myself

Sake cups make nice mame/kusamono containers. Japanese rice
bowls, ditto and since those often are some of the prettiest
ceramics in the world, they're often quite striking (hard to
drill porcelain, but it can be done). Tall bud vases for
cascades. Walnut shell for a small Chinese elm (briefly).

I have several different Japanese tea cups drilled for bonsai.

Ceramic roofing tiles make nice trays for larger trees.

Floor tiles -- chipped around the edges for irregularity (or
not) or cut smaller make nice platforms for multi-tree groups or
clump style trees.

I have a mid-sized Chinese elm growing on a burl from a dead
tree; it'll rot away before too long. It is one big mass of
moss and fern with a small tree growing from the top.

My tastes don't run to the truly odd things for containers --
coffee pots, hubcaps, etc., but I've seen those used. I DO have
a potensai growing in the stainless grease splatter tray you'd
put around your burners on an electric stove. ;-) But that's
NOT a permanent home. Nice drainage hole, though.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Nature
encourages no looseness, pardons no errors. Ralph Waldo Emerson

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