Sep 18, 2017 | General
Anyone who knows me will know that next to bonsai and my family my great passion in life is motorcycles. I have been very blessed to be able to assemble a nice little collection over the last few years. I thought it was high time I put one to good use and so this weekend will be joining thousands of riders around the globe on the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride. Raising awareness and funds for men’s mental health issues and prostate cancer. You may not have seen me in a shirt and tie before but if you are in the Bury St Edmunds area this Sunday it’s your big chance 😉
Please visit this great event if there is one near you or donate here.
G.
Had a great day and collectively raised over £12k for a very important charity. SINCERE thanks to those of you who sponsored me 😉 It’s not too late to donate!
Now back to work
Sep 13, 2017 | General
Nothing lasts for ever (except politicians bulls**t) and so it is with the very first line of bonsai pots we ever offered for sale. These plastic pots are seen literally everywhere and it’s a sad day that they are no more. We have limited stock having bought the last of what was available so if you need some don’t wait or you will miss out.
What we have left is listed here Plastic Bonsai Training Pots
On the bright side we have been buying pots for next spring, so far well over a thousand pots have arrived and will be going up on our web site soon. Bonsai pot supply is becoming increasingly unreliable and expensive over the last couple of years as many manufacturers are changing production to more profitable items such as teapots. As a result there are fewer manufacturers, less choice, falling quality and increasing prices. We are buying up all the old stock we can find but expect to see prices rising for the foreseeable future.
If you are going to need pots for next spring start shopping early 😉
G.
Jul 29, 2017 | General
Just in case you missed it I have a lot of video content on Youtube and embedded right here. Most of those were made a few years back before we became as successful as we have now and before we got so busy. It’s not been possible to do anything for a couple of years now. Back then it was pretty much easy to do as you like and so I put lots of, what i think, is cool music on the vid’s. However that’s now become an issue (copyright) and so we have had to remove most of it. That’s left a lot of crap videos with even crappier soundtracks. I am so sick of dealing with Yt and their bullshit and having my content relentlessly ripped off that I will be removing all of the content over time.
One of the issues we had when making these vid’s back then was a 10 minute time limit imposed by YT. That left out pretty much all of the good stuff. A lot of the videos run to an hour or more in their unedited form. By and large we still have all the original footage and it would be nice if we could get that all put into a new production for folk to see. The problem I have is that I hate doing that sort of thing and am crap at it too. I also have full 12 hour days every day and don’t have a minute to give to such a project. Therefore I am looking for help…….
If you are a grown up sensible person with a proven track record of dealing with these matters, know bonsai and can deal with an opinionated asshole like me then we need to talk. Over the years I have been seen off, ripped off and peed all over by a large number of idiots so don’t be surprised if you are not initially welcomed with open arms.
Now theres a pitch for a project 😉
G.
Jul 25, 2017 | General
Pleased to say I have a few workshop dates for later this year. I came close to having a melt down earlier this year and decided to take a break for the first time in over 20 years. Now I have had a few weekends to myself, ridden a few miles and cut the grass and I’m bored with all that so time to get back to working weekends again. I may also have been leaned on quite heavily and being weak of will easily capitulated. I have just 5 dates and places, as always, are limited to four each day. Sadly due to having been taken for granted too many times I will now be asking for payment up front which pains me enormously.
Details are here Bonsai Workshops
Give me a call to book on 0800 4580 672
G.
What would you rather do?
Jul 25, 2017 | General
Bonsai is all about growing. Growing is all about the perfect balance between sunlight, air, water and nutrients. I have been saying for a very long time now that bonsai is all about growing, if we had more gardeners and less artists the average bonsai hobbyist and his trees would be doing a LOT better. I spend a great deal of time every day talking with folk who are up to their Jacob’s in bewildering nonsense and half truths about how they cultivate and develop bonsai trees. So much of what has become ‘gospel’ in bonsai is based upon half truths borrowed from old fashioned horticulture and applied in the wrong way, at the wrong time to the wrong plants. I am currently (a year now) working on some articles that will open up the mysteries of bonsai horticulture and development but for now here is a good rule to remember…..Bonsai go into bonsai pots.
We sell a lot of raw material and yamadori for bonsai. It staggers and saddens me that the first question I am ever asked by folk that buy such materials from us is about how soon the tree can go into a bonsai pot. So, just to be clear, bonsai pots do not make bonsai trees. It’s a bit like living in the garage does not make you a car. The primary reason to use a bonsai pot is because it looks nice with a bonsai tree, a bit like a picture frame that sets of a nice picture. The secondary reason to use a bonsai pot is to slow the growth of a tree in order to help in the long term maturation and refinement of a bonsai tree. Raw material needs to be grown, and grown fast in order to develop root and branch structure, this process, especially with collected plants, is all about building vigour and strength which in turn means we can intervene in the plants progress in order to develop the shape we want. The harder a plant is growing the more often we can prune, wire and do all the other things we do to control the direction of growth. If a tree only grows an inch a year it stands to reason that we won’t be making any dramatic progress. However if that tree grows an inch a week we have a lot more options. I know that in some parts of the world astounding growth can be achieved regardless of the container used but here in the UK things are a little different and so we need to adopt special techniques in order to make the progress we need.
We have just received delivery of some new pots that are going to make life a whole lot easier for bonsai growers in less than ideal parts of the world……Meet the Ercole air pot.
It takes a great deal of time to create bonsai regardless of whether you are starting with seeds, cuttings, small plants or old yamadori. Ultimately the key to success is a good root system carefully balanced with just the right amount of foliage to fuel growth. The key to a powerful root system is dense fibrous fine feeder roots, and a lot of them. Sadly a bonsai pot is not a suitable container for the development of raw material into bonsai. A bonsai pot is designed to slow and restrict the growth of a tree thus easing the work required to keep the tree small. Always follow the rule, ‘bonsai go into bonsai pots’, never put raw material or undeveloped trees into bonsai pots, their future development will be SIGNIFICANTLY retarded and the process will take many times longer than in larger nursery pots. In all commercial bonsai nurseries across the world bonsai are developed, firstly in the ground, and then in nursery pots before being transferred into bonsai pots where just the final ramification and refinement is developed. We have found that developing trees into bonsai is best achieved with a relatively small diameter but deep pot, this will give the fastest growth rate. Accelerated growth is achieved by maximising the drainage of water through the root zone. Irrespective of the soil constituents used, drainage will always be better in deep soil rather than shallow soil, thus a deep pot will produce higher growth rates.
One of the primary draw-backs of conventional ‘flower’ pots is the tendency of plant roots to circle the pot. Roots naturally only grow down and forwards and after some time in a pot the roots can spiral around the inside often achieving several feet in length. The problem with this is that the white feeder part of the root gets progressively further and further from the tree, thus increasing transfer time of water and nutrients and reducing growth rates. In bonsai we prune the roots regularly at re-potting time which increases the density of fine feeder roots to counteract this effect. The problem with re-potting is the invasive nature of the procedure that can only be carried out at certain times of the year and requires a significant amount of time for the tree to restore it’s balance afterward, thus wasting valuable growing season activity. The efficient answer to this dilemma is what has become known as an ‘air pot’ which is an extremely simple but effective growth accelerating tool regardless of the plants you are looking to develop and grow. Roots naturally extend away from a plant in a search for water and nutrients, the little white end pushes it’s way through the soil relentlessly. If we can snip that tip off, the root will fork and divide behind the cut. This increases root density and the more little white root ends we can develop the stronger the plant will be. Using Ercole pots, once the growing tip of a root reaches the edge of the soil and emerges into the air it dries out and is effectively pruned and that is exactly how an air pot works.
From a bonsai development perspective these Ercole perforated pots are the ultimate growth enhancing tool. Light weight, space efficient, UV stabilised, cheap and infinitely reusable. Because of the shape and construction of the pot it is not necessary to go to the expense of using high quality free draining soil products. A finer more fibrous medium is still going to drain water efficiently. Therefore a relatively cheap growing medium can be used, bark, peat, coir and even regular garden compost will work really well. Because the pot is taking care of root pruning it is not necessary to keep re-potting and messing with the root system, plants can stay in these pots for several years and each year the growth rate will accelerate. At the time you are satisfied with the development of your tree the re-potting procedure is simple because the roots will not be encircling the rootball, it’s just like re-potting a well maintained bonsai tree.
If you are out collecting trees or rescuing skip rats, Ercole pots will offer dramatically increased survival rates and promote rapid re-growth. If you need to restore the vigour and health of tired old and neglected bonsai trees just two or three years in an Ercole pot with a good fertilising regimen will work wonders. Ercole pots are the perfect choice for developing starter trees as bonsai and given correct horticultural practice will produce growth rate similar to what might be achieved in the open ground.
LARGE NURSERY POTS FOR BONSAI
For a long time now we have been selling our popular little Bonsai Nursery Pots. These only go up to 14″ diameter but now I am pleased to say we have managed to source some larger sizes, Large Bonsai Nursery Pots, are available in 15″ 20″ and 24″ diameters. These are a common sight in Europe but much less so here in Blighty. These super tough pots will last for many years and offer a great balance of being fairly shallow whilst offering a good soil volume to promote strong growth. Plastic pots are super light weight, UV stabilised plastic, frost resistant and look a lot better than old chopped off barrels and hastily cobbled together wooden boxes made of pallets that weigh a ton and fall apart after a couple of years. Buy some to hold ‘in stock’ you never know when you are going to stumble across that skip rat that needs a big pot.
G.
