Hi everyone,

Just want to share you my new tree! I've bought it last weekend at a local exhibition, it's a pinus mugo mops, around 28/30 years old and grown as a seedling in Danmark. Buyed from Carlos van der Vaart and I had a workshop from him the next day.

I first removed all the old needles, these needles will fall off during the next year, and because I needed to wire the tree, it was best to remove them now so I could wire the branches till the ends. Best to remove the older needles is in winter, and then cut them off with scissors, when doing this you don't damage the dormant buds and you can promote backbudding with this. The old trays of the needles that were cut off will get brown and fall off.

I wanted to work on it now, so I removed them by hand, then the tree got wired!

Next year this tree will be repotted (around may/june) and I want to promote backbudding and let it grow for now. The begin is made and I'm very happy and curious to see this tree after a few years!

Ps: The photos after the styling are taken from the front, but actually the front is a bit more on the right (so this is not the 'real' front actually)

First picture: Me removing all the older needles
2nd picture: Carlos van der Vaart working on the tree
3rd picture: Result!

What a great tree. It would make any of us happy to own as well. I can't wait to see how it looks next year after the re-pot. Great work.

what a nice relaxing day of needle pulling you must of had what a transformation in a day, it went from nusery stock to a bonsai.
great job youri... now to start searching for a pot

Very cool tree and a nice job styling it.

Thanks all!

I'm going to look for a nice pot, I think I know where to find it. A bonsai nursery here, about an hour away from my home, has a great assortiment of chinese, japanese and european pots. He must have a good one between those pots!

I would go with an unglazed pot. Something simple but classy.

Yes, I agree.

It's a pine, most coniferous trees are the best to place in an unglazed pot, I think rectangular would fit the best. It's a rough tree, with the top made as a jin, so an easy pot without (any) decorations, would fit the best. I will take the tree with me, that's the best way to look for a good pot, but I'm sure he has the pot I need!

Hey Youri,

Just to make sure: You are not planning your tree-repotting/pot-search now are you? I would leave the plant alone for a serieus amount of time (Say the rest of the year). The work done on it was extensive. I would not even take the plant to a shop to find the best pot. Do that later; You do not reallly want to pot the tree in a hot car right

Oh yeah, I indeed forgot to mention that Jelle, on the dutch forum I told that I just leave it to recover and grow this year.

Next year when it is repotting season for pines, I'm going to take it with me to Deshima Bonsai and then I will repot it and search there for a good pot. They have a big choice of pots and Teunis Jan told me he had something nice for it

Hi everyone,

It is 4 months ago now since the styling and it's growing very good! So I already needed to take away the wire, because it was beginning to grow in the tree. It took me 2,5 hours to remove all wire, but without the wire the tree is more open and you can see the structure much better. Fortunately, all branches stayed on the right place and it was a good time of the year to remove wire (autumn) so he did a good timing-job!

Also I have found a good pot for it, I think it will be a rectangular (sort of lotus-shaped) pot, so not too much straight lines, because it has a more elegant shape. I have the choice of a gray or dark-brown pot. I still need to take the tree with me to see if it will fit and match nicely together, but I think it will do fine!

Also it is doing a good job in backbudding, have seen many new buds emerging down the branches!

Pictures will follow this week!