There's a rather silly discussion on the gallery about a bonsai
event somewhere that is having a "Yamadori Boxwood" workshop.
Someone mocked that that meant they were all collected
(presumably in the wild) from the mountains.

This seemed to me to be another example of people insisting that
the shades of meaning of a word don't change over time (and
geography).

I've seen more and more often the use of "yamadori" as merely a
"collected" tree, since comparatively few bonsai now are
collected in "mountains." Certainly none of mine are, few (if
any) of Gary Marchall's, etc.

I think I even read somewhere -- and quite recently, too -- that
even the Japanese aren't kowtowing to the _exact_ meaning of
"yamadori" any more and use the term for a collected tree. The
expanded usage makes sense for both here and there (and
particularly for boxwood ;-) which are mostly collected from old
hedges, though I suppose the plant may still exist in the wild
somewhere in Asia. (Heck, they exist in the wild here -- having
escaped from old farmsteads to crop up in the north Florida
woods.)

Thoughts? Purists vs. loose constructionists. Liberals
(thinkers ;-) versus conservatives (if it wasn't done that way
yesterday it ain't right! ;-).

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - The phrase
'sustainable growth' is an oxymoron. - Stephen Viederman

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