The tree made me do it.

Tags

cutting, experiment, ficus, fig, leaf, propagation

I’ve joked for years that I’m trying to quit tropicals. I only have a handful – 7 or 8 trees. I don’t have any more window space to keep more in the winter, and I refuse to invest in grow lights when there are temperate species perfectly happy to spend the winter outside.

Then something like this happens!

Easy as one, two, shimpaku

Tags

Bonsai, cuttings, juniper, pitting, propagation, shimpaku, success

I have always heard propagating juniper was easy but I never tried it until a couple of years ago. I cut several rather small cuttings (all smaller than a pencil) from a shimpaku juniper, scraped the bark to expose some green cambium, and stuck them all in a pot together.

A collection of shimpaku cuttings

And there they stayed for two years. I considered separating them last spring but found myself busy with too many other things. This spring, I removed them from the pot (shown above) separated the individual plants and put them each in their own container. A few of the larger ones got a piece of wire and a little twist in the trunk.

Shimpaku cuttings in individual pots.

The success rate? 100%! If that’s not easy, I don’t know what is.

A Big Boxwood Experiment

Tags

Bonsai, boxwood, buxus, layering, propagation

It’s been a rough spring! I am having one of those existential seasons that make me question how I can be so incompetent after more than two decades in bonsai. I lost several trees. While none would be considered excellent bonsai by the greater bonsai community, they were my trees, and losing trees is never easy.

My overall conclusion is most of them suffered from nutrient deficiencies and/or root damage caused by record rainfall last summer. That makes it sound like it’s no fault of my own, but I struggled with how to respond to problems as they became evident, and I definitely made some bad decisions along the way.

It’s time to move past that, embrace the growth and renewal of the past couple of months, and start looking to the future (and start writing again). One way I am looking ahead is by playing with propagation. This week I started two Japanese Maple layers. I have had success with these in the past and expect them to do well. If you’d like to know my process for these, you can read about it HERE.

I am far less confident in my latest experiment – a BIG boxwood layer. I have taken successful air layers off this same boxwood before but have never done an air layer this large on anything! The good news is, this is a zero risk experiment. I plan to remove this whole section for the future design of the parent plant, so if it fails and the part of the tree above the air layer dies, it’s no loss. It is going to be cut off anyway.

Since this is such a large layer, I expect it to take a long time and I felt like I had to do things a little differently. Let me show you what I did.

The long, straight upper bit of this plant is the subject. The future design of the lower part of the tree is on the back from this view, and not the topic for today anyway.

I used chalk to mark where I intend to remove the bark and cambium, then used a very sharp knife to cut along the lines, peel the bark, and scrape all the green cambium away from the white sapwood underneath.

After I have it fully scraped, I always recut the top line just to make sure I have the cleanest cut I can get. This is where the new roots will grow.

Here’s where things get different. I intent to use this plastic pot rather than my usual bag technique. I cut it down one side and cut out the bottom to fit around the trunk, but I also have to figure out how to secure it in place and keep soil from coming out the gaps and drain holes. Since it is wrapped around a trunk, it’s a bit more awkward than just putting mesh in the bottom.

I decided to use a scrap of screen which I wired to the tree below the bottom cut.

Then I built up a thick lip of twisted raffia on top of that wire. The pot will rest just above this lip which will serve to hold it in place.

For good measure, I secured the raffia with vinyl tape and then bent down the screen so it would cover the drain holes in the bottom of the pot.

Can you guess what’s next?

Well, yes. Attach the pot, and also dust the top cut with rooting hormone.

The pot fit nicely above the lip of wire, raffia, and tape. More tape was used to close the cut side, and it was filled with a soil mix that includes a couple handfuls of fine sphagnum moss.

The goal is to keep the cuts damp and dark so new roots can form. With the open top, moisture can be monitored and the soil can be watered at any time.

I have no idea how long this might take. My assumption is longer than a year.

Whether it will work at all is another question. We shall see. One way or the other, I will learn something. And isn’t that a kind of success in itself?

For a follow up on this air layer, see Follow up: Boxwood Air Layer.