neil

What I have learned from Mirai Live

October 11, 2018

Well, it’s been a good year and a half since Ryan Neil’s Mirai Live launched at BSOP. I had eagerly awaited this development and decided to bite the bullet and sign up for the full, Tier 3 membership. That means that I can go back and view old videos, take part in the Q&A, or whatever they might be offering. I began to think back about all that I have learned in that past year and a half and it is astounding. Not that it should surprise you, as the content is awesome. Ryan has a way of breaking down ideas, principles, and techniques into an easily understood manner.

But, you need a little background into the aforementioned learning. I was fortunate to be in Ryan’s very first Defining Concepts – Pine series. This is where he began to develop his teaching style and curriculum. We used a small white board and met in the tiny original studio in the converted garage. Just three of us and it was awesome. I went on to take a series every other year on Junipers, then elongating species, and finally, special studies. I drank the Kool-Aid, so to speak, and my bonsai have never been the same.

I had previously taken an entire study course with Boon – ten three-day sessions, which also had a tremendous effect on my bonsai experience, catapulting me upwards to finally grasp bonsai at a high level. So with all of this experience, both with Ryan and Boon, my jaw has just about dropped to the floor over the last 18 months as to what I have learned and assimilated. Lots and lots of loose ends tied together and flagging ideas shored up.

Then there are the brand-new ideas. I can’t really list them in order of importance, but many of them are just, duh, it was there the whole time. Did I not listen the first time? Or in many instances, it is brand new technology and thought applied to bonsai. Either way, after almost 30 years of very actively pursuing bonsai, I really have some tools to take another leap forward. But be forewarned, that usually means more time and energy spent. Most of these are NOT time saving techniques but rather principles to take design and horticulture to a higher level. I can really only mention the general subject matter. I am making no attempt to explain them. That’s Ryan’s job, and he does it well. This kind of information is not free, but it’s, oh, so worth it.

1. Always prune leaving at least two buds. Duh. Pruning a Japanese maple makes this automatic, but not alternating species like hornbeam and beech. I kept pruning my beech back to one bud every year to keep it in check, but in the process, I ended up with long and leggy branches, losing ramification. Not anymore.

2. The purpose of pinching, to redirect strength. Small to medium to weak. Ah, got it.

3. The continued important of water and oxygen balance. Can’t be understated. I understand why some of my trees were strong and others weak. Now they are stronger than ever. This should probably be number one in importance on this list.

4. The difference and timing between foliar growth and vascular growth. I knew about this, but now I know how and when it works and use it to my advantage.

5. How to apply large wire. I have used more 4-gauge copper than just about anyone in BSOP and now it’s a lot easier. I saw old videos of Kimura wiring when I was at Boon’s, and noted what he was doing, but didn’t know why. Now I do. My hands love you Ryan.

6. Less is more with wire. Already a concept I learned from Ryan on wiring, but it has been so great to be able to zoom in and see exactly how he works his hands. Less wire means

more time for me and a more natural appearance.

7. Using foliage mass to power root development when repotting raw stock BEFORE styling the tree.

8. Detailed application of fertilizer.

9. Unlocking the secrets of Douglas Fir. I have two buds on every single branch on both my large Dougs, after pruning. And no more die back. STUPENDOUS. Ryan dug this out and developed the technique himself. Won’t get it anywhere else.

10. Unlocking the subtleties of long and short-needled pines. Too much to go into, but the clarification on timing, fertilization, watering, and purpose has been great.

11. Timing of late season pruning on multi-flush pines to generate predictable buds.

12. How to accomplish rock and slab plantings. Just in time for me to perch an Engelmann on a basalt slab I have been carrying around for over 35 years.

13. Detailed application of raffia – where and when, refining my technique.

14. When to prune my redwood for great results.

15. OK, I have to stop somewhere, or I will never finish.

Suffice it to say that most of these that I mention are adding on to my existing knowledge and technique. Mostly, it’s learning how to manipulate the biology of the tree to get what I am after. Now it might seem like this is an article-long advertisement for Mirai Live. That’s not my intent and you can spend your money and time as you wish. But, if you want to take your bonsai to the level of art, this is going to really add to your arsenal of tools.

If you are like many folks who attended the Rendezvous and don’t have the advantage of having a club like BSOP that offers great basic classes or can’t afford or get into regular classes with folks like Ryan or Mike Hagedorn, this is a must and a steal. So much information for so relatively little price. I had to pay for airfare back and forth to Oakland to study with Boon, along with the study fees and hotel! But this I get it in the comfort of my own home and on my own time. And I can go back and review when needed, which I have done. I never had any concept of knowing it all, but I didn’t realize that there was so much more that I could know. That it didn’t have to be a mystery and it wasn’t just happenstance.

One last word. Q&A’s. Usually once a week, Ryan goes to the white board and answers questions live. He is up to number sixty or so now. That’s over sixty hours of just answering questions. They are indexed by topic in each session, so you can somewhat search for what you are looking for. This is the hidden gem in the whole thing. I have asked a few questions myself. Some questions come up over and over and Ryan handles them adroitly and politely. These Q&A’s really help cover what isn’t addressed in the main streams and allows him to talk about other species, other hemispheres, or differing climates. It also makes him the epicenter for the transfer of bonsai knowledge around the world.

Ok, enough on that. Darn him. Now my trees take even more effort, but they are rocking forward on a fast track and I now have the tools for artistic expression through bonsai. Have fun viewing.

Scott Elser

Three's a Crowd

April 11, 2018

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We are all in the midst of the repotting season and it seems to take quite a toll on our personal and social time as we descend into a furious frenzy of cutting, sifting, chop-sticking, and mossing. However, it also happens to be the best time of year to work on many trees that haven’t been repotted. Such is the case for many of our conifers that are just starting to wake up. It is sort of a lull between deciduous and conifers for me. The weather has really wreaked havoc in the system, both my schedule and that of the trees. We are all a bit confused. Things seem to be settling down and on their way to a splendid spring.

The push right now is to get my conifers pruned, if they were not last fall, so that all of the energy can be maximized and focused in the areas desired. This process also balances out the strength of the tree. One tree that I worked on recently is a largish Engelmann Spruce. Many of you are familiar with this tree. It has been seen at our shows once or twice as well as being shown at the Artisan’s Cup in 2015, National Show in New York in 2016, and the Natives Exhibit at the Pacific Bonsai Museum in 2017. Yep, that tree. It sure has been well travelled. It is also the tree that I, or we, styled together about a dozen years ago, when Boon got me into a Golden State workshop with none other Masahiko Kimura, and his young Jedi apprentice, Ryan Neil (Note the essential shell necklace –vintage Neil). What a fortuitous meeting, with my two teachers and Mr. Kimura. But since this tree spent most of last year up in Federal Way at the Natives exhibit, it was time to take stock and prune out any dead tips, cut back where I could and generally reacquaint myself with the tree.

Golden State workshop with Mr. Kimura and Ryan Neil, 2006

Repotted and ready to go for the workshop

When I exhibited the tree at the Artisan’s Cup, it was a last-minute replacement for a tree that dropped out at the last minute from California. As such, it was some really late nights getting it ready for the show. It was already somewhat wired and cutting in. So I reworked the tree and told myself that most of the wire could stay, though I cut out much of the heavier wire for aesthetic reasons and everything held pretty well. But then it was on to New York the next year, with a partial de-wiring, and adding back some detail wire. I worked on it a whole day with Ryan to get the first branch just right as a model to follow and learned much. I finished the tree myself, but I was dissatisfied with the results. There was this sort of gnawing discomfort that it just wasn’t giving the impression that I wanted. However, I was still very proud of the achievement because it was very full and much more developed than most collected spruces. Maybe too much so. The crown was almost a solid helmet of foliage with not quite enough separation between elements. It has fabulous dead wood, but the foliage was rather boring. Still wondering what the future of the tree was, I sent it to New York and back, and then to Pacific for the 2017 season.

Fast forward to our current pruning session. As I began looking for back buds to prune back too, I realized there weren’t many. Much fewer than I expected. I think this was partly due to the reduced amount of light at the Museum and less fertilizer during the season (per my instruction, at the time). But as I began to look at the branches, I think there was another big contributing factor. And that is, overcrowding. There were just too many branches to support. The tree grows like a juggernaut, but all of that energy was being dissipated into more and more branches. This is a very good problem to have. It took a good dozen years to get here, but now I realize that it was time to reassess and start thinning things out. While pruning this tree I was very committed to the rule of two. Only allow two branches at any intersection. It could be the trunk and a branch, two larger or two smaller branches, or a large and small combination. But two is going to be it and I was going to be ruthless about it. It was then that I discovered that I had junctures of three and four branches all over the tree. In my desire to maximize the foliage mass for consecutive shows I had inadvertently sacrificed the structural quality of the tree. I was so focused on the creation of nice foliage pads that I didn’t fully reexamine the tree each time I touched it. It is very common to leave three shoots on the end of branch for fullness before a show. But since I had stacked all these shows up in a row, after four years, those shoots turned into ramified branches, which I hadn’t questioned. I also discovered that this was a major factor contributing to wire cutting in at an astronomical rate. Spruce are known for wire marking rapidly and this tree is no exception. The stronger the bend, the more it cuts in. That is very predictable on spruce.

When folks are new to bonsai, they generally fall into two camps. Pruners and Waterers. The Pruners are people who will readily prune their trees down to a stump without blinking an eye. The can leave the tree rather weak and unresponsive until it builds it’s strength back up. Waterers are content to nurture their trees slowly over time. They would prefer to go through a long prayer ritual to the bonsai gods before they are ready to cut off a single shoot. I definitely fell into the former camp and have learned to balance my approach. But this spruce had had enough of nurturing. Now was the time to prune. It was DAMN hard. I spent a lot of time growing those branches. And mostly, they were good branches. I had to weigh many factors. I was not going to keep three, sometimes four, branches at one juncture. So, what to do? Do I keep the two shorter ones? Do I keep a long and short? Do I keep the one on the right or left? So, here is my little hierarchy to make those decisions.

One, keep the branches with live buds. This is so hilariously obvious yet is the one I get caught on all the time. If you have elongating species, like the spruce, and you pinched it the previous season, you won’t necessarily have buds on the tips. Plus, there can be insect damage, overall weakness, etc.… So always check to see if there is a bud. Next, do I need the length? Sometimes I do. At other times, I want to compact and keep it short. In that case, I like to keep a long and short branch. It looks more natural and develops more elegantly. Thirdly, where are the adjacent branches growing? By pruning, will I make a hole, which may actually be desirable for some negative space, or is there a better branch available to take its place? In all cases for this spruce, there was always something available nearby. And finally, can I improve the structure of the tree? Can I eliminate flaws like crossing branches? For a show, I may wire things into position to fill a hole that I would never keep long term, or so I thought, four years ago.

Now that the job is done, I have a renewed fondness for the tree and vision for the future. It was quite harrowing at first, but now I see a tree once again. Good trees are intimidating, old and large even more so. By pruning, it got older and more tree like, and I now feel as though I can bring it to fulfill the potential it has had all along. The tree looks great and I would have to show you the garbage can full of branches to prove that I pruned anything. Please note how the apex is slowly being moved to the right and that the back branch is finally peeking around the right side. I left all of the wire that was not cutting into branches on the tree to help hold it for this next growing season, but come fall, I am really looking forward to completely de-wiring the tree and restyling it from scratch. I just did not have time now, with preparations under way for our spring show. It is now set up to grow vigorously through this next year and build up strength for a good styling session. There will likely be much more pruning at that time. But at least for now, the strength is balanced and many structural flaws are eliminated. Remember, three’s a crowd.

Scott Elser

NATIVES Exhibit at Pacific Bonsai Museum

April 12, 2017

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This weekend I had the privilege of attending the opening of the new, summer long exhibit at the Pacific Bonsai Museum in Federal Way. This year’s special exhibit is simply titled, NATIVES, and features bonsai native to all corners of the good ol’ US of A.

What makes this exhibit stand out is the comprehensive approach to a visual presentation of the American landscape. Fourteen vignettes portray a distinct segment of the American outdoors featuring a backdrop painting by German artist Luna Tinta. Wonderfully abstract at times, and others times representational, these paintings create a palette of colors rhythms that draws you into each landscape. In each scene, a bonsai from noted Northwest artists like Ryan Neil, Mike Hagedorn, Randy Knight, Dan Robinson, and myself, as well as trees from the museums permanent collection pair with each painting.

Completing the visual treat are kusamono created for especially for each scene. BSOP member Vicki Chamberlain of Ashland created custom ceramic containers representing each locale, partly from materials or minerals from the same locale. Maryland artist Young Choe then created wonderful kusamono with plants from again, the same native locale. Can you say native five times fast?

The whole effect is simply stupendous. We’ve not seen anything like it and certainly it is going to have an effect on North American bonsai, much like the Artisan’s Cup has, in setting new standards and a different approach. Accompanying the main displays in each alcove are two additional trees from the same region, often by the same artist. You will probably see species and forms that you’ve not seen before. And some trees rarely seen as bonsai.

A favorite of the crowd was the Tucker Oak representing southern California. Gnarly, twisted, and still bleakly bare this time of year, the palette created with the golden hills is so different than my own green Northwest. Another feature of the scenes is that they incorporate different views. The Redwoods, represented by the museum’s own outstanding specimen, is shown with a backdrop looking up straight to the sky through a patriarchal grove. It adds a very visceral action to the scene.

The display featuring a cascade Douglas Fir of my own is just the opposite. This view is of Ecola State Park from the air. It’s a calming sea of blue. This is the same tree, by the way, that was featured in an 18 month long, side by side demo with Ryan Neil and myself a few years back. It has come quite a ways in a relatively short time. Speaking of Ryan, the color of the Badlands painting paired with his Ponderosa Pine was astounding. Rich and elegant, the view is full of punch and energy.

One of my very favorites was Michael Hagedorn’s exquisite Mountain Hemlock grove, which won the Best Conifer award at last year’s National Show. It is paired with a view of Mount Rainier and calls to mind the way that you usually have to try and sneak a peek of the peak through all of those branches as you hike along. And the vine maple accompanying it completes a very graceful scene.

Along with the scenes listed above, you will find Alaska, the Bayous, Apostle Islands (Lake Superior), the Appalachians, Yosemite Valley, the Rockies, and the Cascades. Credit for this innovative and challenging exhibit belongs squarely with Aarin Packard, the curator of museum. It’s really his vision that initiated the concept and drove it’s creation. The exhibit runs from now until October 8th. Be sure to check on museum hours before you go. And if you can’t make it, you’ll be able to view it in pixel form on Mirai Bonsai soon. Or just use that as a nice preview. An exhibit catalog is forthcoming.

Ponderosa Pine and Badlands by Ryan Neil

Douglas Fir and Vine Maple with view of Ecola State Park by Scott Elser

Mountain Hemlock and Vine Maple with Mount Rainier by Michael Hagedorn

Redwood with Redwood grove, museum collection

Sierra Juniper and Yosemite Valley, museum collection

Tucker Oak and Tehachapi Canyon, museum collection