Soil

Bjorn. Where do you source your customizable Aoki?
All sources on line have different premixed ratios ( some not even contain lava rock or pumice) and certainly not particle size.   I live on the east coast (Boston area) so our weather is a mixed bag.  I would love to just be able to order this premixed with correct particle size.   I also have no problem sourcing all the materials and mixing myself, but again, no particle size options.  What vendors/merchants do you use/recommend???

Hi! Bjorn answered you on the course as well, but to be sure:
From my understanding, customizable blends are usually reserved for massive wholesale orders, not for individual buyers. Bjorn
www.bonsaiempire.com/courses/intermediate-course-3/03

Oscar,

Thank you very much.  I have not seen a reply in the forums until now.  Nor  have i seen one listed in the course comments, only 1 comment asked by Razvan and answered by you..  Nothing else shows up.  I am not able to see what it is you are telling me is there, Just an FYI.
Again, Thank you so much for your assistance. I really do appreciate it.

I used to take the 1/3 - 1/3 - 1/3 ratios very seriously and measure out exact amounts, carefully filling a measuring cup up to exactly level, and so forth. Then carefully stir to get a very even mixture.

I saw a video of a Japanese bonsai expert in England demonstrating repotting. He had three wheelbarrow of akadama, lava rocks, and pumice and he had a large plastic container. He took two large double handfuls of each, dumped them in the plastic container,  stirred his hands around three or four times, and proceeded. 

What wound up in the pot was probably 30% to 40% of each component, not necessarily evenly distributed, and if that is good enough for an expert, that's good for me. Now I spend much less time mixing.

In fact, what I do now is sift all of last year's repotting left overs, guess it is about a third baked clay, pumice, and lava, repot the tree, dump a bunch of coffee grinds on top, and use a chopstick or something pointed to poke the stuff around the roots, and wind up with a lot of all four components in the pot. The trees are all healthy and I have to pinch them back all summer, so it must work.

What are the coffee grounds for, in your situation?

Dave L wrote:

What are the coffee grounds for, in your situation?

The summers here are pretty hot in the months July to September. Of course, everybody says that, but we can count on August at least being over 100F/38C. Last July I left Milwaukee, where they thought 92F was hot, and arrived in Birmingham at 108F/42C. Nights will rarely drop below 90F/32C. Of course, if it rains it cools off below that. It rained four or five days last August. 

The usual soil mixture doesn't hold water very well in that heat, so most people around here add some kind of organic to their soil mix. I use coffee grounds; some buy commercial potting soil; one guy uses a food processor to grind up pine bark.

One club meeting we talked about soil mix. Every person said they used the standard mix but added something for water retention. 

Dave L wrote:

What are the coffee grounds for, in your situation?

 

Coffee grounds increase the acidity of the mix, but above all cats don't like it, so they stay off the freshly repotted trees, in my case.

FrankC wrote:

Dave L wrote:

What are the coffee grounds for, in your situation?



 

Coffee grounds increase the acidity of the mix, but above all cats don't like it, so they stay off the freshly repotted trees, in my case.

I used to have problems with squirrels knocking the trees of the stands. Maybe the coffee grounds discourage them?

The water here is pretty basic, so maybe the pH balances out.