My brothers chinese elm keeper

Well, My brother invited me to hi house to see his new baby. While in the back yard I noticed that he had a small chinese elm growing in a planter on the side by a wall. His whole backyard is paved except along the wall. I asked him if he wanted it. It looked peculiar in its place. He told me that it was a weed and that he had hacked it many times.

I did the gracious thing and offered my services to remove the tree (my wife asks me why can’t I be normal?). He was in favor of removing it. I came back a month later and started digging the tree out.

The tree was easy to remove it was in soft soil. It had a curved tap root and two other roots that held the tree in place. The problem was that there was hardly any fine roots by the base of the trunk. All the bigger roots ran under the cement or under the wall. There was nothing to do. I sawed off the tree big roots and the tree came out no problem.

I got it home and noticed that the tree had a very bad reverse taper. Also, my brother had hacked at the tree at the same place over the last year. This forced the new growth to try and become the new leader. So the tree has five or six branches all side by side growing straight up creating a little wall.

When I got the tree home I chopped off the bottom 3 inches because the taper was grotesque. I am hoping that it will grow fine roots from there. I left everything else the same. I didn't even trim the branches down. I know that if the tree lost branches they would lose them at different heights so I was willing to gamble.

It has been raining quite a bit so I have noticed only the tip of the tallest branch has wilted. Not bad at all.

wilted leaves

right side of pic leaves ok, left side leaves dead

Wish me luck. Cheers.

Yamadori, Bonsai in nature

When you start learning about bonsai you start to come across the word yamadori. Although I have not confirmed the literal translation many have said that it means collected from the mountains. There is a kind of mystique about wild collected bonsai trees. It is a  throwback to the golden age of Japanese bonsai. I can picture people climbing cliffs to extract a prized tree to sell to some feudal lord.  

I was hiking through Joshua Tree National Park when I came across a wash that cut through some boulders. Off in the distance I saw pinyon pine. I got closer to take a picture. I started to go around a boulder for a better shot when I saw the most amazing thing. I saw a two and a half foot pinyon pine growing out of a crack in the rocks. It had dead wood, it had great taper, it had lots of needles. I was awe stricken.  

My backpack for scale

What is yamadori really? It  is a tree that has not had enough water, or nutrients, or grew to high of an elevation to develop properly. Some have had animals gnaw on it.  Some have had weather maim it. I Believe that you can replicate all of this at home. Take a moderately sized woody plant. Grab a baseball bat (or cricket paddle) and take two good swings at the plant. Let grow for two years and swing at it one more time. Let grow for two more years than harvest. Then you can have a plant that will be uber hard to work with just like yamadori. In fact I believe some people grow trees  in the ground and let the wildlife forage  and walk amongst the trees. They harvest the trees and sell them as yamadori. I am not criticizing, More power to them. The greatest benefit to buying yamadori I think is to work on a big size tree that is a slow grower. 

Yet, like i said earlier there's a feeling of something special about yamadori. To collect a wild grown tree. Then help it survive, then help it thrive. That is very special. Maybe it is not the tree itself but the work that goes into the tree that is special. I would love to hear your ideas about yamadori. Cheers.

Update 04/22
In this video Walter pall talks about yamadori bonsai and shaping them.