Just for the record olives have to be one of my favourite trees used for bonsai. That’s not because I have some soppy romantic notion of warm scented groves enjoyed on balmy evenings on holiday. I don’t get to have holidays. I like olives because they are tough and get on with the job in hand without whinging or flopping about like so many other species do.

Olives love living in England. If you live in the far extremities of the island you might like to think twice. However I am yet to find anyone (who has a modicum of skill) who has not done well with olives. The trick is to buy the right plants in the first place. You MUST have the tiny leaf wild variety. Those big leaf olea europea sold in garden centres are no good at all and generally fade away after a few years. The small leaf wild variety is as tough as a scrap yard dog.

We pretty much pioneered using olives for bonsai in the UK and have had them on the nursery for 15 years now. To read more about olives as bonsai see…

Heart of the Mediterranean the Olive Tree as Bonsai

Finding good olives is a mine field. Avoiding dodgy shysters, crappy stock, recently collected plants with no roots, the list of pitfalls is longer than you can imagine. We recently accomplished this feat and turned up a bunch of stunning little trees, all very well rooted in their pots, in good soil and ready to sell right off the bat. Prices are pretty good too for this quality.

These will be making their way onto our web site soon but in the meantime here are a few snaps. Prices range from £165 to £450 including VAT.

G.