Table Trees

[summer_jackel]

Here are some progress photos of the four little yearling-graft Japanese maples I brought home last summer.


The red dragon.






The red filigree lace. It's the only one of the four I'm doing any training with right now, but I have high hopes for its beautiful shape if I brace it this spring.


The rubrifolium in situ.


The waterfall, which is a little scruffy and slug-nibbled right now.


A little redwood in a pot.


These, clearly, are not trees at all, but meet my ducks! All five of them have reached maturity and are healthy, lovely ducks who are now living outside. The two drakes are Dutch Bill (after a local historical figure) and Onyx; the three hens are Silver, Steel and Labradorite, which shortens to Lab. Yep, I have a black duck named Lab, because I am that funny.

Comments

[smile-n-cuddle.livejournal.com]

That's gorgeous! It looks like bonsai. Is it?

[summer-jackel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I think that the best answer is that they will be bonsai in a few more years, if I continue to train them. I've been hesitant to apply that term to my older maples, which I have shaped and trained in a way at least somewhat informed by traditional Japanese tea-gardening aesthetic, but which are larger container trees.

My plans are to keep these four at least somewhat smaller, and the filigree lace at least will not be permitted to get much taller at all, since it is already a beautiful shape. The brace is there basically to support a shape it already wants to take, so that it can grow enough trunk to support itself, while holding that ideal curve. I'll prune and repot it accordingly, and, if it ever gets so nice that it seems "finished," I'll put it in a bonsai pot. So I guess it's a bonsai...

[smile-n-cuddle.livejournal.com]

So cool! You're so talented!!

[summer-jackel.livejournal.com]

Aw, thanks. I am a total amateur, though!