I wrote:



It's going to be next to impossible to design a forest
bonsai via e-mail, but real help from folks who live
where you are may not be too far away.





Then MartyWeiser proved me wrong and wrote:

Jim is correct about slowing down and getting help from a fellow Bonsaist if
possible. In case you can't get the help here are a few suggestions.
- Spring as the buds are just opening is the best time to construct the
forest. I like to have a few leaves starting to show since it proves they
are growing to me.
- A. palmatum will take a great deal of root pruning. Placing the trunks 2"
apart will be fairly easy - 1" will require either some very careful fitting
or very good aftercare due to extreme root pruning. Make sure you can keep
them from frosting after a major root pruning.
- A seven tree A. plamatum forest could go into a pot that is anywhere from
about 7" long to perhaps 15-20" depending upon the size of the trees. For
typical 6" pot material that will range from 1/8" to perhaps 1/2" diameter I
would think an oval 12" long, 8" wide, and 1.5" deep would work well
(shallower once you have more experience). You might consider planting into
a box of similar dimensions first to get it established.
- Design is tough via e-mail, but here are a couple of initial comments -
with experience nearly all of them can be ignored. Make the forest
asymmetric. Have a major tree and perhaps a secondary tree - the other just
fill in. The major tree should be off center and towards the front, the
secondary tree should be on the opposite side (not the same distance from
the centerline of the pot) and further back. The minor trees around the
edges and the back are important - particularly the back. Don't break 7
into two groups since the breaks are awkward.
- Arrange the trees on the bench this fall and see how they fit together.
Then rearrange. Visually cut some of them back to make them shorter (use
tape or similar to mark the cuts if you need to).
- Figure on cutting off over 50% of the total tree height and branches when
you assemble the forest. I cut off over 80% when I did a 15 - 20 tree
forest this spring for a club demo. It is in a box and will go into a pot
in 2 - 4 years. I had some of the seedlings for this in boxes for about 6
years - a few of the fill trees sprouted last year.

Good advice, all of it, but as a newcomer to bonsai, please
at *least* read a few books that describe the how-to of root
pruning before you try. Putting this many trees into a
shallow pot *will* require a good deal of root to be removed
and it would be too bad to butcher a couple of them.

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

************************************************** ******************************
++++Sponsored, in part, by Sue Crabtree++++
************************************************** ******************************
-- The IBC HOME PAGE & FAQ: http://www.internetbonsaiclub.org/ --
+++++ Questions? Help? e-mail +++++