Hey everyone,

I received a Juniper procumbus nana about 3 months ago as a gift and everything has been going great until recently. I had to leave for a week and could not find anyone to take care of it in that time period. I tried setting up self watering systems from YouTube, but none worked when testing. As a result, I had to do a last ditch effort of watering it and then having it sit in shallow water for the week I was gone (yes I know, not the best idea). The bonsai came in soil that was incredibly absorbent beyond what I thought it was, and ended up sitting in waterlogged soil for 2 weeks total, before it dried out enough to water again.

Today I noticed recently there is 1-2 small branches becoming brittle with wilting/yellowing foliage, and another medium branch that is beginning to have yellowing foliage as well. Overall, 90-95% of the bonsai looks great and lively, with only very minimal signs of a discoloured needle here and there. What would be the best course of action here? If it gets worse, would removing any sick roots and repotting it to new, well draining soil be the course of action? Or should I simply wait it out? It's important to note that it's fall right now and I live in Ontario, which is a zone 5a climate, and we're about 1-2 months away from freezing temps.

I'm quite new to bonsais so I could very well be overreacting. Any help is appreciated, thanks in advance!

I take it there was no rain. No do not re pot, that will only make it worse. It is highly unlikely that overwatering has caused the problem. Losing a couple of small branches or some foliage is not that big a deal. Just leave it and it will recover in time. No fertiliser and be careful with the watering.

Do you keep it indoors or outdoors?

Interesting you say it overwatering likely won't cause this. Would too much fertilizer potentially cause this? I have a diluted fertilizer mix that I use every 2 weeks in the summer, and I did give more of the mix than normal to the plant before leaving. I noticed a significant amount of new growth when coming back, so maybe it had a bit too much and got a bit stressed as a result.

While I do normally have it outside, I did have to bring it inside as there are a lot of wild animals and stray cats in my area and didn't want to have them pester the juniper while I was gone. So this could have had an impact as well.

Too much fertilizer or wrong can do that. Keeping it indoors can do that.

Junipers are green long after they died. So likelly it did not die wile you were away.

We have junipers here growing in peat bogs. They are obviously in a absorbent soil and wet almost always.