noissee

i picked this up cheap at my local garden center (under 10$ ) and it was not tagged. i believe it is a yaupon (not sure on spelling), anyways the roots interested me, and as i was uncovering them, they just kept going and going, so i decided to turn this into an exposed root sort of project. this is just the first trimming, and it seems to be a great candidate for clip-and-grow, so i'm going to try to minimize my wiring if possible.

when i bought it.


i trimmed it the day i got it, and it back budded profusely and grew for a few weeks. this is the initial styling. the roots have great movement to the right, so i'm going to try to keep in that direction. i want a nice moving branch coming out and down from that second break point on the right.


thoughts? ideas? criticism?

JTGJr25

I agree a very interesting root system and it has potential. I disagree with your intentions though. I believe the branches should lean to the left of the roots to simulate the roots clinging to the side of a hill or rock.

Tom

noissee

interesting. sort of semi-cascade?

JTGJr25

Yes you could do that or just keep it as a slanting style.

Tom

pondering sage

noissee,

i like the feel of this tree. i envision a small battered tree, i think this would reflect the chaos in the surface roots. a good start. it looks like a bunch of my trees, in the sense that it will need time to fill out.

noissee

yeah i definitely don't want it any taller than it is now. when i envision it a few years from now i see it as a penjing sort of planting. the tree raised up on the left side of a tray with the limbs sort of coming down the hill.

AlainK

I had never heard the word before, though the scientific name is known to me : Ilex vomitoria.

For those ignorants like me, here is what you can find on Wikipedia :
Ilex vomitoria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As a coïncidence, we had a conversation about toxic plants at the restaurant tonight, and one of the youngsters who wrere there is doing a degree in pharmacology and mentioned "vomiquier", Strychnos nux-vomica.

When my kids were younger, I taught them not to chew on my bonsai...

__________________
Alain K.
http://www.rdb45.fr
http://ak2.apinc.org/bdB

subnet_rx

Hmm, either I've got the wrong name or you do, because I have a yaupon holly and it doesn't look anything like this tree. The leaves are smaller, the bark is much lighter in color, and the branching is different. Maybe I have a different dwarf variety or something.

noissee

well like i said, i'm guessing because it did not have a tag on it. so there's a fairly good chance this is something else.
it's a neat little tree though. grows really fast.

KimchiMonger

noissee,

Great find! That second photo and root display is a gem!

I'm in N.Texas where the holly does very well as a large shrub and makes up part of much landscaping here.

As a beginner myself, not having a lot of bonsai growing experience nor thousands to spend on finished high quality bonsai, I've entertained the idea of working with affordable nursery stock other than a couple of $100 range trees I've acquired. I was excited about the challenge of taking a seemingly ugly bush in a plastic pot and trying to uncover a trainable future bonsai.

I'm posting initial and soon to be progressive pics of a couple of hollys I'm working on now. Not masterpieces but hey, for $10 and a learning curb on my part I'm working on developing them the best I can and then some.

You can check some of them out here:

Nursery Stock for Miniature Trees

Randy S.