Pine

Inital Dec 2011 Pine Pair
Skip to single pine tree #5 later on

Style: Pair of trees. One windswept and root over rock. (Soju is the Japanese for Two-tree, Fukinagashi is wind-swept, and Sekijoju is Root-over-rock.)

Pot: Handmade from duct tape (regular, white, and red) ~$6; old storage container ~$16; wire and misc bonsai stuff ~$3; time! ~6 hours

Trees: Aleppo Pine Pinus halepensis and Italian Stone Pine Pinus pinea

Bought: Nov 26, 2011 from OSH for $18 each

Style: Pair of Aleppo Pine Pinus halepensis and Italian Stone Pine Pinus pinea - A fun pair! Need girth too.

Conception: For SBBK Dec 11, 2011 holiday party! Goal is candycane striped pot with pair of XMas style trees in it. Idea was shorter tree (Aleppo Pine) at top of hill in windswept style and then taller tree (Italian Stone Pine) behind it, with fuller form, planted lower down the hill from the first. Plan to cover in a layer of white (snow) and put a mini sled in there, maybe spray a snow on the trees.

Training: ~10 hours Dec 3rd and 4th, 2011: Created a soil of one part smaller red lava rock, two parts small river rock, and three parts (dust removed) granular diatomaceous earth. Partly combed out outside of rootball, leaving the core intact as I read somewhere Pines don't take well to bare-rooting. Mounted tress in pot; the pot has a bunch of integrated cables to attach to. The higher tree is actually hanging in the air at this point. Slowly chopsticked in new soil everywhere. Put in a wall of (eadible) seaweed as this thing has two levels. [Next day.] Thing is way too heavy, especially watered. Pulled out a lot of soil and 'planted' a bunch of empty plastic containers ($0: water bottles, KFC and Chinese soup takeout things); went from almost a full paper shopping bag down to just over half a bag! Also wired in a rock and two mesh fence sections, making the two levels much more interesting and combining with the root over rock better. Cut out a lot of branches and folliage. Changed the apex on the Italian Stone Pine. Wired a bunch of the Aleppo Pine's branches to be lower and wind-swept, even a clear wire to pull the whole apex over and down. Soil still low, sphagnum moss (weighted with rocks) is over the nebaris and root over rock roots. (Ideally I'd like to use light to train the windswept look!) One big open question is how to display the root over rock even though it's not stable and grown in yet?

Pix:

* Bonsai on the lawn wide, tight, then close-ups of mini handing candy canes on each of the two trees - 2011-12-20. See how the white "soil" looks like snow!

* Two bad 2011 Dec 7th iPhone pix then PhotoShop'ed slightly to be more clear: First a wind's POV of the tree's, then below a side view of the two trees. (Regretfully, this shows hows I screwed up and the pot is too big for the trees...) (The pre-ps pix, 2, and 1.)

Update Dec 12, 2011: "Showed" the trees at the holiday party. It was well received, but while people liked it, this piece is not really in the same class as it's peers it was with. I'm really happy with the mini candy canes I made! Will try to get some good pix. It's on the front lawn now, as holiday decoration!

2011-12-20: