The Bonsai Blog of Rune Kyrdalen

This is how the tree looked after I potted it up last year. I put it in a polytunnel to keep it out of the sun and wind to reduce evaporation.

This picture was taken today, may 20. 2008. As you can see the new shoots are enlongating and the tree looks very healthy. I cut off 3 branches where the foliage was very crowded, now one can see the trunk better. I always work very slowly with collected spruces. I will not do more work on it for now. I will repot it in august and remove as much as possible of the mudlike peat from the boggy area where I found it.

Here you can see all 5 trunks. They look very good in my opinion! The bark is very old looking and rugged. The mature bark even extends all the way to the top of the tree and some of the branches. I have high hopes for this tree.

I first found this spruce in 2006. It was growing almost at the timberline at about 900 meters above sea level. The foliage was yellowish and it has obviously been growing very slowly and is probably very old. I was very exited when I saw that it has several trunks, it’s very rare to find a good multitrunk spruce like this one.

The tree was growing not far from our cabin and I fertilized it several times during 2006 and 2007, and in the beginning of august 2007 I decided it was time to collect it. I always collect spruces in the late summer, they have a much better survival rate at this time of year than they have in spring. This is probably because the spruces usually have quite few hair roots when I collect them and if I collect in spring, the hot summer months cause too much evaporation from the tree so they dry out before they can produce new roots. In august spruces have a new round of root growth and have enough time to produce new roots before winter sets in.

I was surprised to see that I could actually see new hair roots in the bottom of the root ball when I collected the tree, this is not usual when I collect spruces. This is probably because we had the wettest summer I can rememer last year so the tree had enough moisture to grow more than usual during summer. (see part 2)

This BIG pine was collected about 2 weeks ago

I got a good rootball so the chances of survival are very good

This is how it looks after it is potted up and put in a plastic house. It will stay there over the summer to speed up the recovery from the collection.

Here is an update on the Lonicera in my previous posts. It is in full leaf now and it even has lots of flowerbuds. I diden’t expect it to flower just one year after collection!

This Lonicera was collected last spring. It was cut back to a stump and severly root cut. it was growing in a very claylike soil so all the soil was removed. It’s around 20 -25 years old.

It had no branches or buds after collection and was planted in a wooden box and let grow freely for the entire growing season. It responded extremly well and new shoots appeared all over the trunk. I removed only the brances that appeared on the wrong places on the trunk or where several branches appeared at the same place on the trunk. 

Last autumn I worked on the deadwood and wired the branches and placed them where I wanted them. I did not cut any of the branches back, this will be done this summer when I take off the wire.

This spring there are new buds all over the branches and it’s time to repot the tree. It had grown so many new roots that I couldn’t lift it from the wooden box. I had to knock the sides off it.  It was wonderful to see all the fine roots that had grown. It was no problem to reduce the rootball so it would fit into a properly sized pot, not the final one but good enough for now. From now on the main task will be to develop the ramification.

Here is another pine I collected this spring that I have high hopes for. It’s very compact and has an interesting twisted trunkline.

It was growing in a crack in the rocks and had a compact rootball and I only had to cut off some long running roots

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It looks like the trunk has twisted around itself

The foliage is close to the trunk so I don’t have to wait for backbudding on this one.

After collection it was placed in a frost free greenhouse (not the one in the pic) together with my other early spring collected trees. Placing trees in a humid, wind free  environment after collecting has a very positive effect on the trees survival rate. I have no doubt about the survival of this tree. Progress will be reported.

This pine was collected this spring. Rough bark and lots of movement in the trunk ; -)

The rootball was very compact and I got the whole rootball when I collected it so it should not be long before I see good growth on this one.

Here is a new pine I collected recently. It will be a semicaskade in time, but first it will get several years of rest and free growth. I will cut off the long branches in time, but for now they will help produce energy to ensure as much growth as possible. 

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Here are some impressions from one of my collecting trips

This pine was collected in sept. 2007. It has lots of potential and as it stands now it is 63 cm tall and has the rootbase has a diameter of 24 cm.