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Bonsai

First Time Bonsai: a 5 Points Survival Guide

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More often than not, the approach to bonsai art comes with a present. A friend, a relative or a partner gives a new little tree in a short pot and he can’t tell us how to handle it.

Those bonsai trees are set on a piece of furniture or next to a window and normally die in a couple of months. Here comes the misconception that bonsai trees die after a short time.

But a bonsai can live among hundreds of years (there are specimens of 1000 years and more), so you are not excused if you let your bonsai die. But what to do with that strange thing?

This is a brief kick start guide to help you in the first months with your bonsai:

Establish what species it is: first thing first you have to know what species your bonsai tree belongs to. It is important because every species has different needs. This may be a hard task, there are hundreds of species and each can have a lot of varieties and cultuvar.

To start you don’t need to know the exact variety or cultuvar, you just need to know the general name of the species: it could be a maple, an elm or it could be a pine or a juniper.

Arborday.org has a guide on the trees classification that can help you. Also Wikipedia has a classification list.

Set your bonsai tree outdoor: unless your bonsai belongs to a species native of tropical regions, you have to put it outdoor (of course if you live in a tropical place you can set your tropical bonsai outdoor). A bonsai cannot survive indoor due to a handful of reasons, if you assume your bonsai is an ornament you are wrong. Period.

If you identify the species, you can know the precise spot where to set it. Usually conifers should go in full-sun, the other species should be set in mid-shadow or even shadow. This is a really rough distinction and there are a lot of exceptions, a good cultivation sheet can help you a lot.

Learn how to water it: watering is a crucial task and one of the most difficult of bonsai cultivation. Every species needs different quantities of water, and you should understand the needs of your own bonsai tree.

The bonsai lives in a small pot, there’s a relatively small quantity of soil in it and the tree can certainly suffer dryness and temperature excursions.

As a general rule, if it is summer you have to water your bonsai every evening. If you water it in the morning the soil will dry in no time and the tree will suffer. If you water it in the evening it’ll have all the time it needs to adsorb water and nutriments and, even if the next day the soil will dry, the bonsai will not suffer.

During spring and fall you have to diminish watering, just wait until the surface of the soil starts to dry out and only then water. It is easy to over-water your bonsai tree, so follow the rule above and you should be ok.

During winter the bonsai wants little water, just keep the soil humid, not wet, and water when it begins to dry.

There are two watering methods: the first is giving your tree a shower and continue until the water exits from the drainage holes; the second is to immerse the pot in a can of water and let the soil adsorb.

In both cases remember to bathe the foliage too (never if the sun still hits).

Fertilize your bonsai: fertilizing is the most underrated task by the novice. It is really important to fertilize the bonsai because the soil in the pot will easily loose it’s nutriments for the tree.

The quantity of soil is limited and it is an isolated environment so it’s our duty to provide nutriments. If your matter si if water is sufficient, the answer is no. Can you live just drinking water? No. For your bonsai is the same thing.

Until you become an expert, a balanced fertilizer (10:10:10) will do it’s work. You don’t have to acquire a bonsai specific fertilizer, the bonsai has the same physiology of all the vegetables, every fertilizer will do. Remember just to dilute it more than the recommendations say or you’ll risk to burn your bonsai.

A simple and good solution would be to use the hanagokoro, a Japanese organic fertilizer, very strong, easy and safe to use as it is almost impossible to overfeed.

You should fertilize during spring, when the vegetation begins, until July (in the boreal hemisphere) then stop in the hottest period. Restart in the second half of August until October (November for the conifers).

Get another bonsai: only action will allow you to gain the sufficient experience to manage a bonsai. Keep collecting bonsai and make your own, with try and errors you will become an expert.

Needless to say it is a great satisfaction to produce your own bonsai and a lovely feeling to watch your bonsai garden growing.

You may have noticed I have omitted such tasks as pruning, wiring, jin, shari and so on. This is a primer, a kick start guide, born just to help you keeping alive your bonsai.

Defining what is a bonsai isn’t easy, but we can resume it in the “perfect balance between the tree, it’s form and the pot hosting it”. If you don’t learn how to take care of your tree, and limit your experience to this primer, your bonsai will survive but it’ll loose its “bonsai title” in a couple of years or less.

If you are serious with bonsai art, you want to study. You can buy books – I will soon post reviews – or read some good online resource – in the sidebar there are a phiew -.

Of course keep reading this blog, I will post a lot of things about bonsai.

If you think this list isn’t complete (keep in mind it’s a survival guide), feel free to add your points.

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Easy Bonsai Care for Beginners

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Bonsai Care: First Things First

As with any garden, the basic elements that your bonsai plant will need to thrive are the right soil, the appropriate amount of light, and the right amount of water. 

However, bonsai care involves fulfilling certain needs that ordinary plants don’t have. For instance, did you know that most bonsai trees are bred to be outdoor plants like their full-sized counterparts?  If you bring a sun-loving bonsai inside, be prepared to give it 12-16 hours a day of fluorescent light. There are, however, some bonsai plants that do not need that much light, and these may be the ideal species if you want to practice bonsai care indoors.   

Another important element of bonsai care is utilizing the right soil.  In the “wild,” trees grow tall due to their deep root systems, which dig deeply into the earth.  In contrast, your bonsai will grow in a shallow tray or container, and therefore, your tree’s root system cannot penetrate deeply downward. Instead, it will spread out shallowly, thereby reducing your tree’s growth.  For this reason, bonsai plants need a special mix of soil to ensure that their roots don’t become waterlogged and drown. Because they are grown in such shallow containers, regular potting soil is much too dense and will trap too much water, killing the tree’s roots, and eventually, the tree. 

In practicing proper bonsai care, you should purchase special bonsai soil, which is a mix of loam, sand, and organics, like peat moss and leaf mold. What soil you should specifically buy is determined by your local climate. Your local greenhouse or nursery, bonsai enthusiast, or Agriculture Extension office can help you determine which soil is perfect for your bonsai’s care.  

Water and Food in Bonsai Care

Of course, the one question all beginner bonsai gardeners have is “when should I water my bonsai?”  The answer to this important bonsai care question depends upon what kind of bonsai you have, how humid or dry the air is around your bonsai, what time of the year it is, and other variables. 

Ideally, in bonsai care, you want a balance between too much and too little. Don’t overwater—but don’t underwater either. Make sure your water is at room temperature, as you don’t want to shock your plant with either cold or hot water. If you use tap water, let it sit out overnight so that the chlorine and other chemicals can oxidize out of the water. 

Wet the soil first, which will increase the bonsai’s ability to take in more water.  Afterwards, soak the soil until water runs out of the drainage holes in your training tray. Make sure that the entire soil mass gets wet. Watering is best done daily in the early morning, before the plant begins its daily photosynthesis cycle.  You can also mist your bonsai on a daily basis to help it retain its necessary humidity levels.

As for fertilizer in bonsai care, use a completely balanced fertilizer (i.e., 20-20-20, which is equal parts nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium) every other week at quarter strength.  A balanced fertilizer is ideal in bonsai care because your tree is considerably smaller than the plants the fertilizer is typically used for. Never fertilize a dry tree (the shock could kill it – make sure to water first!) and don’t fertilize a sick tree; remember, fertilizer isn’t medication.

With the right amount of water and light, along with appropriate soil and fertilizer, you are well on your way to growing a beautiful bonsai collection.  Bonsai care does not have to be difficult, as long as you remember to meet the fundamental needs your beautiful bonsai plant has.

Jonas C. is one of the authors/ contributors to the Australian blog Bonsai Master. After getting his first bonsai tree a couple of years back the art of bonsai has become something close to an obsession Jonas is now a bonsai enthusiast who spends a lot of time researching proper bonsai care techniques.