off to Versailles

I will be away for a few days. Look at my travelogues after Monday evening.

Before I left I made this picture of a Japanese maple, 30 cm high, pot by Petra Tomlinson.

preparation for Versailles - part 6

This is a shohin Japanese black pine like one can buy them by the dozens in Japan. It has a few faults. I will speak about it in my tree critique and then probably do a few things ot it. We will see whether it will be better or worse.

preparation for Versailles - part 5

This mugo pine was never shown before. It is 60 cm high in a pot by Derek Aspinall. This is a discussion piece for the tree critique. The French love to discuss art and artistic details and concepts like no other group that I know. It will be interesting. I think this is a literati tree. Let's see what they think.

preparation for Versailles - part 4

Two larches will also go to Versailles.
The first one was discussed extensively in the French forum and they asked me to brign it to continue their discussion in Versailles.

preparation for Versailles - part 3

My most advanced ponderosa pine will also be shown. While for me this is normal it seems to exite a few Americans. The density is for real and also the color. This is what you get in eight years if you know what you are doing.

Pinus ponderosa, ponderosa pine, 55 cm high, pot Derek Aspinall, collected in Colorado by Larry Jackel

preparation for Versailles - part 2

Now everything is ready to leave early romorrow morning for Versailles. I have rented a big truck like one would use to nmove the household. 15 trees altogether are aboard. Thsi will be an 11 hour ride over 1000 kilometers one way.

Here are some:

for a change I will also show some shohin; maybe some as accent trees to the large ones.

1) maple shohin
2) dwarf honeysuckle with two fronts
3) European larch
4) garden lilac, this may not be the very best bonsai, but it is remarkable, being a normal garden lilac and only 19 cm high.
5) Scots pine, not quite a shohin, but still very small (26 cm), from seedling

preparation for Versailles - part 1

On the coming weekend we will have the big Convention in Versailles, France, right in the historic part of the castle garden.  This is going to be one of the 'Grand Slam' conventions of the European bonsai world. They have asked me to hire a truck and bring a real lot of trees. Well, here is the story of my preparation.

1) Alex helps with the fat mugo.
2) fat mugo as it will go to Versailles. I decided that this picture will also go to the North American vs. Europe contest of AoB.
3)  naturalistic Scots pine as it will got to Versailles.

Big RMJ after some work

Here is the huge one after I have taken offf the wire and edited it somewhat. Again the kind of problem one wants to have: which one is the better front?
I will leave the tree alone now during the summer and then wire the whole thing again. This juniper works out tremendously. It might be ready for Gingko 2009.
The pot is by Horst Heinzlreiter.

a real lot of stone slabs - part 2

more slabs.
One with spruce planted onto it.

a real lot of stone slabs - part 1

These are sinter stones from a volcanic area in Germany. They are not mainly of calcium, but of harder and heavier materials. All these are outstanding. I purchased these last week to always have the right slab for a tree or group. I might sell some. They are not cheap! One has to compare them to the crescent pots. These are the real thing and one can tell. Why shold they be cheaper than the copies? They are hardy.

Here is one with spruce planted on it.
And then here is my loot of last week. Most of them are shown twice, turned upside down. They are full of character, color, texture. I am exited.

My demo tree from EBA 2007

European spruce, Picea abies, collected in Switzerland, pot by Derek Aspinall.

1) 2005, first picture still in Switzerland
2) 2005, in my garden
3) 2005, in new pot
4) 2007, before the trip to Oostende
5) other side
6) 2007, May, after the demo
7) other side

back from EBA 2007

see 'travelogues'

Azalea in full bloom

This one I got instead of a fee for working an a client's pine. Not a bad fee at all. I only have three azaleas including this one. They don't do too well with our pipe water, which is extremely hard, 22°!

Azalea, azalea indica, 55 cm high, from imported material.

off to Oostende

Tomorrow I will go onto the long ride to the North Sea, to Ostende, Belgium. There I will moderate a group of demostrations and I will also have my own demonstration with the spruce that I showed earlieer. I was asked to bring two trees which I have already shown. But the larch that I had shown was not really the one that I wanted to bring with me originally. This literati larch was the one. But A week ago it seemed that the new foliage was having problems and would come out unevenly. It rained heavily for a few days and now the tree looks very much OK. I want to shwow this one because it was never ever on an exhibit. Literati larches are extremely rare. And this is so old and mature as bonsai. Not a piece of wire. I think it hs deserved to be shown.

Larix decidua, European larch, collected in Switzerland, around 100 years old, 55 cm high, pot by pPer Krebs.

1) best front
2) not so good, but also not so bad

I will be back on Monday and report about Oostende on my travelogue blog.

The elegant RMJ - part 10

Ok, finished for the time being.
The back still looks like a better front. Which it is not in reality. And then the one shot from the left side looks quite intruiging too. I am contemplating of changing the setup to this front. It could well be done now.

front
back
possbile new front
virtual of what it can look like in fall of this year.


Rocky Mountain Juniper, Juniperus scopulorum, 55 cm high, collected in South Dakota, older than 500 years!, pot by Peter Krebs

The elegant RMJ - part 9

Almost finished. Only one more hour to work.