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Exaco Trading Company Biostar 1000 Premium Insulated 8mm Twin-Wall with Protective Netting Cold-Frame from Amazon.com

As fall temperatures dipped in the Boston area to mid-teens at Thanksgiving, I was concerned that my original plan for winterization of my outdoor bonsai would not be sufficient. It seemed in retrospect that simple storage boxes were not going to be sufficient to protect my trees from Boston’s extreme temperatures. Boxes only provide protection from wind and I wanted protection against hard freezes. It felt like this would be another extremely cold winter, like the prior year.

Armed with this knowledge, I invested in a cold frame. Searching the web for an appropriately sized cold frame, I was lucky to find the Booster 1000, a premium insulated 8mm twin-wall constructed cold frame from Exaco Trading Company. You can find it on Amazon here. Be fore warned, it is not cheap at $216.86. It measures 40″ deep x 30″ wide x 17.5″/20.5″ height (the back is higher than the front). It was difficult to assemble, partially because the instructions are in German and all I could do was follow the pictures. I finally got it put together, but it took close to 2 hours. Frustrating but in the end satisfying that I had a decent system in place to protect the trees. I can also take this apart where each panel meets and store it easily in a storage unit. I will make my own instruction sheet and mark each side with a letter to guide putting it back together next year.

The top of the cold frame can be closed and has 2-panels that slide to provide easy access or air on a warmer day.

I moved the trees into two larger mulch insulated wood crates with stapled burlap on the sides so that air can circulate, and I put thick plastic sheeting on the bottoms of the crates with small holes for drainage. The crates where then placed in the cold frame. Additionally, I have a large plastic basket that resembles wicker. In this, I surround a few trees with mulch, and placed this in the cold frame too.

Trees buried in mulch, in crates or a large basket. The cold frame fit on top of these items

I only need to water them two or three times a week (at most) and this will slow down from January to March. I’m pleased with this setup and it’s easily storable when Spring arrives.

Categories: Bonsai

Fertilizing

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on November 12, 2018

Biogold Original fertilizer, available from Amazon.

I tested out a bunch of fertilizers this summer and settled on B.O Biogold Original. I’ll get to why in a bit. First, here are my impressions on the other fertilizers I tried.

Initially, I liked the idea of a liquid fertilizer but soon found it was not that efficient. I’m all about making it fast and easy, and using a liquid fertilizer, I found, required more steps than other methods. I had to replace one of my two existing watering sessions (morning and evening) with watering from a can. I never feel like watering from a can really soaks my bonsais well, and my collection seems to like alot of water. I water with a hose and a wand, and I get great results with this combination. Using liquid fertilizer in a watering can felt like I was moving backwards, not forwards. Secondly, measuring the amount of fertilizer and mixing it with the right amount of water always feels like guess-work. Thirdly, I found it difficult to find organic liquid fertilizers. Most of the ones I ordered from Japan were just chemicals, which, from my research, breaks down soil quicker than organics. I did find a liquid at my local bonsai nursery but again, it was a liquid. So I abandoned liquids altogether.

Next I tried rape seed cake. These are large biodegradable organic cakes that you just place on the top of your soil and as you water, they degrade and feed your tree simultaneously. I was partial to these because I felt like they broke down far too quickly. I also didn’t see any major difference in growth. And the bad part is that my dog liked them — anytime she was out on the patio and a bonsai was on the ground, she’s try to eat the cake off the top of the soil. I thought this might lead to an expensive vet bill. It also turned out that some birds where swooping down and eating it as well.

Next I tried small, 2 – 4 mm sized, pellets made of chicken poop and other organics. I liked the results I got but the entire patio stunk. If my neighbors spent more time on their patios, they would not have been happy. The dog liked to eat this too! Plus, it was hard to have guests over for rosé and cheese if the whole patio smelled of chicken poop. So that didn’t work well either.

Finally, I found B.O Biogold original. The pellet sizes are about 8 cm in width and they are placed on the surface of the soil, or buried relatively easily. Pellets last 4-6 weeks, which is much more efficient than fertilizing with liquid every two weeks. For shohin size trees, which most of my collection is, you only need a few on the surface. For really small mame size trees, you can easily cut a pellet in half and place each piece on opposite sides of the tree. I place them closest to the edge of the pot so that the fertilizer doesn’t harm any nebari near the trunk. For larger bonsai, you can place small baskets that have a stake on them around the pots edge and fill them with pellets. I also like how the pellets degrade. I like to change them every 4-6 weeks but I actually think they might last 8 weeks or more, even with an aggressive watering schedule like mine.

Categories: Bonsai

When You Have No Greenhouse

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on November 8, 2018

I will replace this crate with a larger one and a plastic sheet with slits in it will cover over the top in mid to late December.

There is a great way to protect your outdoor plants that I find works well. I did this during the 2017-2018 winter and am just starting to do it during the 2018-2019 winter. Here is what you need:

A large wooden slatted crate
Heavy clear plastic sheeting
Mulch
Burlap
Staple gun with staples

Staple the burlap to slatted outside of the crate. This will protect your plants from harsh winter winds but allow in enough air. Staple the plastic sheeting to the bottom of the crate and then make a few slits in it with a knife so that water can drain out. Put a layer of mulch into the crate, place your plants on top, and then surround each with a healthy amount of mulch. Do this in the beginning of November or before the first frost.

As December arrives and the temperature drops to freezing or below, I like to place more mulch into the crate to cover the entire pot as well as the lower portion of all of the trees’ trunks. Now, I staple a layer of thick plastic sheeting over the top of the crate and make slats in it to allow in water and air.

I left may plants outside throughout the entire winter of 2017-2018. In some instances I allowed snow to accumulate on the trees. And as soon as spring arrived, I removed them from the crate and disposed of the mulch. The crate then went into my storage unit for the next winter.

Categories: Bonsai

A Small Shimpaku Juniper

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on July 1, 2018

This project was a lot of fun.

Recently I’ve become enamored with small bonsai. “Shohin” (meaning “a small thing” in Japanese) or “Mame” (meaning “bean” in Japanese) are the classifications for small bonsai. The latter are 5 to 8 inches and the former 2 to 6 inches. Not surprisingly, their pots are smaller too, and with that additional reduction in pot size comes slightly different care needs, like more frequent watering and greater care when wiring.

In my opinion, shohin and mame bonsai are easier to care for in a city dwelling from the simple perspective that they take up less space. Thus, if you want a larger collection with variety, shohin or mame might be a good alternative for you. But sizes still require outdoor space of some kind. A small deck or back yard will do, preferably with direct sunlight. While direct sun isn’t desirable for all mame trees, you can easily craft a covering screen to provide shade or protection to those trees that can’t tolerate stronger sun (early spring and mid-summer).

So, with my latest interest in shohin and mame bonsai, I decided to re-pot a larger Shimpaku juniper that I bought last year. During the re-potting, I combined pruned both the top and the root system hard; experts say you should only do one per season but I threw caution to the wind. In the end I removed 90% of the top and almost 90% of the roots to fit a 1 1/2 inch (25.4 mm or 2.54 cm) cascade style unglazed pot. It’s only been two days since the re-potting, so it’s anyones guess if the tree will survive. Below are pictures. See what you think. Below the pictures is a brief description of how I turned this much larger tree into a tiny mame tree.

The tools I used were a root rake, a wooden chopstick, a concave branch cutter, a pair of find nosed tweezers, a wire cutter, two different widths of wire, and a pair long scissors like trimmers.

To start, I cut off the wire holding the Shimpaku in its original pot. Then I slid the tree out and using the rake and chopstick removed all of the old soil. Then I cleaned the roots with water and prepared to trim back the main branch. I left 4 sets of two branches each on the main trunk. Then I removed the first two sets closest to the root ball. This left 2 set of branches on each side. I cleaned these up by removing a few needles from the under side and where each branch meets the main trunk. A few twists to remove brown branch ends completed the pruning. Next, I wired in the mesh screen, added a wire for securing the bonsai, and a light layer of small pebbles on the bottom. A small layer of all-purpose bonsai soil from Bonsai West in Littleton, Massachusetts followed. The tree was then wired in. This is always the most difficult part for me. I’m not sure why but I’ve not got the knack for securing a tree with a single wire, but after some trial and error, to my surprise the tree was secure. I then added more soil and worked it with my chopstick making sure the soil well positioned amongst the roots. I left a small lip gap at the top where I placed cut up rehydrated sphagnum moss. Then I used a double-strand of wire to bend the trunk of the tree more profoundly then it had been in it’s prior pot.

And the wire helped to turn the branch area up at the end. I think I might need thicker wire at the end because I want a more pronounced shape. Maybe at the end of the summer.

For more information about shohin bonsai, read this post at Bonsai Empire, or this post about mame bonsai. Also, Shohin-Bonsai Europe is a great resources for information about smaller trees.

Categories: Bonsai

Repotting

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on May 27, 2018

One of the things that most vexes me when repotting is how best to secure the tree. I’ve found ways of doing it but I was never that happy with my results. Either the wire twisted around the wrong way or the tree just wasn’t firmly seated in the pot. I recently found a very good blog post on bonsaitonight.com that covers multiple ways of securing a tree to the pot. I wish I’d found this post eons ago because it would have saved me tons of frustration!

Read the post here.

Enjoy!

Categories: Bonsai

Protecting Small Bonsai from Harsh Weather

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on May 25, 2018

I recently had both a mame Shimpaku juniper and a shohin Tropical Cherry topple due to high winds. There was no pot or plant damage to the Shimpaku. However, the Tropical Cherry was completely uprooted from its pot (I was planning to repot it anyway and had not secured it to the temporary pot). I swiftly repotted it, securing it to the pot with wire.

This got me thinking about methods for protecting smaller bonsai from sudden gusts of wind and other storms. I found quite a bit of information online so I thought I’d digest most of it here.

For shohin bonsai, there are two ways to protect them from the elements. The first is a common way by using string. The second is a method I found partially on the internet with my own modifications.

The first or string method secures the tree pot the plank it sits on using string (this assumes the tree is on a plant or table that you can tie string under and above). Do this by tying two pieces of string across each side of the pot with the tree stem between the two strands and tying the string in knots under or at the edge of the table/plank. You can also use one piece of string and criss cross it under the table to cross both sides on top. These are pretty common and you can find a number of articles that show different ways of implementing this method as well as the types of knots to use.

The second method is appropriate for small shohin or mame trees. First, you need to find a large bonsai pot or a larger tray that has drainage holes. This sounds easier than it is and it will undoubtedly be more expensive than the string method, but I think the will looks better, retaining a zen quality to the display. (See the image for an example of the type of pot I’m referring to).

The pot is large, over 20″ wide and about 13″ deep with a height of almost 4″. Prepare the pot with screens, then fill the bottom with larger pea sized gravel. On top of that use a good blend of 2mm-3mm Japanese bonsai soil (Akadma & pumic) and mix in a small amount of peat moss and crumbled bark mulch. The bonsai soil will provide good drainage and the peat moss and crumbled bark will help to retain some moisture. Fill the pot with this mixture leaving 3/4″ of before the rim. Now fill in only Japanese bonsai soil on the top leaving about a 1/4″ – 1/2″ lip. Now water the soil well until water seeps through the drainage holes. This will help to eliminate dust in the Akadama and pumic mixture and will moisten it well. Now, place your smaller trees into the pot by sinking them into the soil mixture by a 1/4 of an inch. You can sink them to a greater depth if they are more prone to tipping.

Not all trees can be sunk and secured this way. For example, cascading trees need to be sunk in the corners or up against a side so that the tree can cascade over the side of the larger pot but this isn’t going to work for every cascading tree.

I implemented this on my deck recently and found it was an effective way of securing my small trees and it has the added benefit of looking nice with my existing patio furniture thereby retaining a look that I was striving for.

Good luck and let me know if you have found other ways of securing your bonsai against the elements!

Categories: Bonsai

Archive for

Winterizing Outside Plants

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on December 13, 2018

Fertilizing

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on November 12, 2018

When You Have No Greenhouse

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on November 8, 2018

A Small Shimpaku Juniper

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on July 1, 2018

Repotting

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on May 27, 2018

Protecting Small Bonsai from Harsh Weather

Sherwood Hughes

Posted on May 25, 2018

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