These trays can also be bought mail order (5/$5.25) with or without
drainage. See your Charley's catalog p.39.

Bart
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jim Lewis"
To:
Sent: Friday, March 07, 2003 10:11 AM
Subject: [IBC] Keeping Shohin Alive


There's a Shohin thread in the Gallery running and that is one
of my
favorite sizes to work with. Easy to collect natives that size,
easy to
repot, easy to get cheap plastic training pots for...but...

Where do you keep these?

I'm outside Austin, Texas, USDA Zone 8a, and with weird 17
degree F freezes
after winter's over, then summers with whole weeks over 110 F
(about 6 weeks
over 100 each year, at least a couple days around or over
120)...I can't
keep anything that small alive outside!

Miss just one of the two or three daily waterings and,
csheeeek! Toss at
least one on the compost pile!

John,

Ninety percent of my bonsai are shohin-size trees, and more than
half of those are under 6 inches tall. As far as temperature
goes, yours and my climates are similar, but I do have quite a
bit more humidity.

Carl has given you an excellent suggestion. Depending on how
large your shohin are, and how many you have, purchase one or
more 10x20-inch flats (WITH drainage holes). They're 2-3 inches
deep, usually. Sometimes your local nursery will give you one or
two (or you can buy a flat or two of petunias for your yard ;-)
then make use of the flat(s).

The 70-pound (I think) bag of all-purpose sand sold at Home Depot
should be OK for this purpose (it is MUCH too fine to mix into
bonsai soil!). Fill the flat, then embed the pots in the sand
and water thoroughly (REAL thoroughly, the dry sand will want to
repel water at first). The sand will stay damp for quite a while
(especially if you keep the trees under a lathe screen or shade
cloth). Except on the very hottest of days you may even be able
to get away with a once-a-day (in the morning) schedule.

The other option -- and the one I use -- is to set up a DripWorks
(or similar) system on a timer that waters a couple of times a
day. This system will cost you about $150 for the tubing and the
emitters and a decent timer (I use the battery-operated Gilmour
timer, carried in my area by both Home Depot and Lowes). There
are timers that you wire into your electrical systems which are
as reliable as your power company, but if you change your
batteries every 6 months, the battery-operated systems are fine.
This can be a hands-off system -- which isn't the best way to
grow bonsai, especially small ones, but . . .)

DripWorks is reachable via www.dripworksusa.com. You can also
get timers through them. You may find a local supplier. HD and
Lowes carry similar systems, but they may be a bit more expensive
and do not provide the wide range of options.

I have my system set for every-other-day watering this time of
year (though it has been off for 4 weeks because of the
RAIN!!!!). In summer, I set it for once-a day, in the evening.
I check my trees in the A.M. and provide supplemental watering if
necessary. But then, I'm retired and can do that. You can set
the timer for once- twice- thrice- or whatever-times-a-day.

Shade from your Texas sun will be a MUST for all of your small
trees. Even if they didn't dry out, the summer sun could heat up
the pots so badly that you would cook the roots -- and if the
roots were damp, you'd par-boil them. Last year, our club's
April show was held in sunny 90-plus-degree weather. It is
always outdoors (alas) and trees in dark pots really suffered. I
had a bald cypress grove there and I blame the loss of three
trees over the winter on that early exposure to heat.

Hope this helps.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden


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