Hello all! First post on here but I've been using the site as a resource for awhile now. I collected my first tree with the intention of making a bonsai about a year ago and have since been growing a half dozen or so without much intervention yet. I've read a ton but still have no clue what I'm doing, so just hoping for feedback or opinions or just a hello!



Pinus mugo - Only tree I've purchased so far. $9 from a local nursery so I picked it up with the intention of practicing heavy pruning, repotting and wiring techniques.



Hopefully some good nebari potential



An interesting backward lean...still considering adjusting where the front is



Overall I think this tree has some potential, obviously significant scarring and I'm sure it doesn't follow bonsai principles strictly but I'm interested to see how it grows. Or it'll die and I'll learn not to prune like 40% of the roots & foliage



Pinus contorta - Wild collected, a less impressive trunk now that I have the mugo but I really like the short needles and it back budded fairly well (I think) last summer. Potted in it's original sand cut with 30%-ish horse manure/cedar shavings. Hasn't killed it yet...I desperately want to look at the roots but I'm waiting until late winter to repot.



Again hopefully some surface root potential. This root runs to the edge of the pot.



And (almost) the entire family all together in my janky cold protection setup.

Thanks for reading and all the info so far!

Hi Ty, I think your Mugo has great potential.
I have liked the price of it also!

Hey Welcome to the empire!

Nice to see you dive in and get your hands working on some wiring, which looks neat for someone just beginning. I for sure did not wire like that in my first year!

Now .. that being said.. You would like some pointers right? So take a breath, move your eyes down. Please realize.. NOT trying to put you down, but trying to give you some ideas to develop your skills

First and foremost... Bonsai is a marathon. As with marathon runners you need to conserve energy and health to make it to the finish line. FOr pines this means.. One major 'insult' per year. Pines grow relatively slowly, and need a lot of time to recover from changes. So if you dig it up, it needs AT LEAST a year to establish itself. If you wire it.. Leave it for a year before repotting. If you repot it.. Ah well, you get the gist.

Do not be fooled by appearance. Pines are killed easily by impatience and in general, you need good health on trees to respond well to the techniques applied. Going slower gets you to the endresult faster. (If you push a tree to near dead, you may loose one, two or even more years for the tree to get back to reasonable health during which it does not develop. Had you waited for a year for the next step, you would have gotten there fatser).

If you look at your mugo, you see the lowest branch on the left first come up, and then bending starkly down. In the Netherlands, such a branch is called a "pissing curve". It is not meant positive . If you look at trees, typically on pines they fall down at the attachments on the trunk. Only rarely do you see branches come up in a solid angle to the trunk, and then reverse direction. Try to avoid these bows.

Now you are going to tell me: I could not get it to move. And you are right. If I look at the wiring, you could do with a little heavier wire. The guideline for getting the right aluminium size is by taking a piece of wire and pushing it against the branch you want to bend. If the branch moves before the wire bends you have the right thickness. The same goes for the branch in the top. You have wired it with a wire too weak to really keep the shape you could put in the trunk. As such, you now have a weak change of direction but not much more than that.

Soo.., if I look at the wire on the contorta trunk coming from the ground, all I can conclude is.. That wire is not doing anything. It is too thin to bend the branch. As such you have wasted your money (Wire bought, used without a function) and the tree is less pretty to look at (Stupid wire on the trunk!). So .. Wire when needed. And if needed, use a wire strong enough for the task.

These are things that you will eventually do without thinking, so don't worry about it. In the end, once you have put a kilometer of wire on trees your hands will do the work and you can switch off your brain.

Nice work so far!

Ty wrote:

And (almost) the entire family all together in my janky cold protection setup.

I am not convinced you need this. And if you do not need this, then is is working against the health of the trees. Pines typically NEED a good period of cold weather and can stand deep frost well. So unless you get -10c or colder, I would not put them in a small enclosure where you have high humidity and low air movement...

Clicio wrote:

Hi Ty, I think your Mugo has great potential.
I have liked the price of it also!

Thank you Clicio!

"leatherback' wrote:

Now .. that being said.. You would like some pointers right? So take a breath, move your eyes down. Please realize.. NOT trying to put you down, but trying to give you some ideas to develop your skills

Thank you so much for taking the time to break down my trees I know it isn't always easy or fun and I appreciate you being willing to do so!

"leatherback' wrote:

If you look at your mugo, you see the lowest branch on the left first come up, and then bending starkly down. In the Netherlands, such a branch is called a "pissing curve". It is not meant positive . If you look at trees, typically on pines they fall down at the attachments on the trunk. Only rarely do you see branches come up in a solid angle to the trunk, and then reverse direction. Try to avoid these bows.

Good to know. I didn't try to put much bend in that first branch so I'll give it a look today. Would a solution be to bend that first division on the lowest branch upward more? Can you suggest any resources on desired shapes and movement when wiring bonsai?

"leatherback' wrote:

Now you are going to tell me: I could not get it to move. And you are right. If I look at the wiring, you could do with a little heavier wire. The guideline for getting the right aluminium size is by taking a piece of wire and pushing it against the branch you want to bend. If the branch moves before the wire bends you have the right thickness. The same goes for the branch in the top. You have wired it with a wire too weak to really keep the shape you could put in the trunk. As such, you now have a weak change of direction but not much more than that.

Soo.., if I look at the wire on the contorta trunk coming from the ground, all I can conclude is.. That wire is not doing anything. It is too thin to bend the branch. As such you have wasted your money (Wire bought, used without a function) and the tree is less pretty to look at (Stupid wire on the trunk!). So .. Wire when needed. And if needed, use a wire strong enough for the task

Good point on the contorta, I had a lot of trouble moving the trunk. That was my first ever and looking at it now the gauge is too thin and I could have put more wraps in. I'll probably end up taking it off and just leave the branches wired.

And I will take them out of the box! I got a bit worried with a freeze but it was only about -2c.

Thanks again