Club News - March 2023
Marsha Mekisich – Maple Spring Care
March 17 @ 7:00 pm – 9:30 pm
At our Nov 2022 meeting Steve Iwaki worked on a twin trunk trident maple that had been collected several years ago by club member Lonnie McCormick. The tree was very healthy but it needed a good clean up to remove excess branches so it would be ready for continued refinement this year.
Now that spring is with us this tree will be popping out new growth - which needs to be controlled in order to get the best out of this tree. Marsha Mekisich will be doing this phase of the work and using it to illustrate different aspects of Spring Care for maples. The type of work needed varies depending upon age of the tree (development vs. refinement phase) health and variety of maple.
Marsha encourages members to bring in one of their maples for Show and Tell. She may use one or two to illustrate her points.
Monthly Tasks
Each month there are a number of tasks you need to do to your bonsai – from repotting, to fertilizing to spraying for pests. We have put together a checklist, customized for the San Francisco Bay Area to help you. This checklist is adapted from earlier work by Mitsuo Umehara.
This month: March Tasks
Final Potting Party – Sunday, March 12
Our final potting party will be Sunday, March 12 from 10AM until 4PM or earlier depending on the number of trees we all bring to work on. In the event of anticipated heavy rains, we will notify you via an email the day before.
Club potting parties are held to work on trees that can be sold at our Annual Show (this year that’s April 29-30). We can work on material that can be repotted in the winter which includes deciduous trees, junipers, pines, cedars, etc. Soil, pots, and wire are provided as well as some club owned trees in need of some attention. You will have an opportunity to purchase a tree during the potting party. For members who can come early to help with setup or stay late to put things away, your assistance is greatly appreciated. You don’t have to stay the whole day.
Donuts will be provided, but also consider bringing a bag lunch.
Beginners Workshop - Sunday, March 19
For advice on trees, access to a wide range of bonsai tools, and a fun and informative time come to our monthly Beginners Workshop. We have made several changes to the format and no longer have a morning and afternoon session, so please RSVP with when you think you will be arriving so we can plan. Rita Curbow and Jenn Tan will be assisting. To sign up for the workshop, or for more details, contact Richard .
Attendees are encouraged to check the Timing Work Schedule included in this newsletter to decide what trees can be worked on that day. Even if you don’t have a tree to work on, you can learn by observing others at work or assisting someone with their tree. The best way to learn bonsai is by doing it alongside someone with experience. If in doubt, contact Richard or Rita.
Intermediate Workshop - Saturday, March 25
Once again we’ll be having an Intermediate Workshop for Kusamura members, this time focused on maples. Because the weather may be unpredictable we will meet inside Cubberly Community Center, Room D6.
To keep this workshop to a manageable size for our teacher we will have a maximum of 12 participants in this workshop. You must sign up to attend.
For more details and to sign up visit March Intermediate Workshop – Maples
2023 Annual Show Update
Setup is Friday evening, April 28. Show on Saturday April 29 and Sunday April 30.
Kusamura’s Annual Bonsai Show gives members an opportunity to take stock of their trees and choose a couple of favorites that they’d like to share with each other, family, friends, and the public. Our show is well-attended and beautiful, thanks to Kusamura members pitching in as usual. We look forward again to this satisfying and enjoyable annual gathering—and the fine attention to preparing our trees to show their best. Our newer members, who may never have been to a show or participated in creating one, will be amazed!
Important change: Bring your show trees to the site no later than 9:30 AM on Saturday morning. Your sales, donation, consignment trees should be brought in at set-up on Friday evening.
This year’s show will include the following components:
- Formal display of trees including stands, accent plants and scrolls
- Outdoor sale of donated and consignment trees and pots
- Children’s Corner guiding kids to create their own accent plants to take home
- Saturday: Oak demonstration by Michael Greenstein
- Sunday: Kusamono demonstration by Barbara Phillips and friends
- Education Space where visitors can join members to learn about and practice some of the skills we use in bonsai.
- New this year: Tours of the show by bonsai experts at 11:15 AM and Noon daily
- Doctor Bonsai where you can get advice on your bonsai tree. Manned by Gordon Deeg and others
- Film on pot firing, by Richard Phillips, running continuously
- Benefit Drawings for trees and pots and other items, both days
Members Only
- First dibs presale of donated and consignment trees and pots on Friday evening
- Friday night pizza for those who help with set up
- Saturday and Sunday lunch for members (information forthcoming)
- Quick Strike celebration after show take down
Show Trees
- Show will include trees in development as well as developed show trees. We encourage all members regardless of level to participate in any way you feel comfortable.
- Members will be able to reserve club owned stands as needed in advance. Information to be provided soon
Sale Trees
Gentle Reminder: All members are encouraged to donate two trees or bonsai related items for the club sale. Value of $25 or more. New or first-year members are not required to fulfill this club obligation. Donations help cover show expenses, the largest item of our annual budget.
How to Sign up for Show Tasks Online
Sign into your KusamuraBonsai.org online account to access the club website, then from Members Only menu (on the top line) find Club Show Information.
Review the various Show Tasks for which we need member sign-ups. All members are expected to help with set-up on Friday night (starting at 6PM) and with take-down on Sunday afternoon (starting at 4 PM).
Sign up for as many additional slots as you can. There are more slots than members, so we need you more than once. Be an early bird to get the slots you most want! See below if you haven’t logged in lately or have questions.
Manual signup also available during March meeting.
ALL HANDS on deck for Friday night set up and for show take down (strike). It’s fun when we all work together, taking part in making our show spectacular! Oh, and did we say we are serving pizza on Friday!
Make Certain Your Login Works
It’s time to start preparing for our annual show. For several years we’ve had information on our website with hints for preparing your tree, how to do consignment sales and descriptions of the different tasks that we need people to volunteer to do. This year we’re adding online signup sheets to make it a bit easier for people to see which tasks need volunteers and to sign up right there. However, we don’t want to expose this information to non-club members - so it is hidden unless you’re logged in.
Most of our users have logins already, but if you don’t please fill out the Membership Form.
If you’ve forgotten your login info see the Help menu for Reset Your Password.
You can also contact our webmaster - Dave Curbow at info@kusamurabonsai.org.
Pay Your Dues Online
If you haven’t paid your dues yet for 2023, please do so soon.
The easiest way to do this is to click the Login button in the menu bar above. Once you’ve logged in you’ll see the Members-Only menu. In that menu you’ll see a link to Renew Membership. We've tried to make this as painless as possible.
Note, if you joined the club in October 2022 or later then your 2022 dues also apply to 2023. You don’t need to pay until 2024.
If you’ve forgotten your login info see the Help menu for Reset Your Password.
February Meeting Recap – Eric Schrader - Juniper Design, Styling & Development
At our club meeting on February 17, 2023, Eric Schrader worked on a juniper from Stephanie North. Neither he nor anyone from the club could identify the variety. There are thousands of varieties, as Eric said. This particular juniper has been neglected and not trained carefully as it has grown over a number of years. “It has been left essentially to its own devices,” said Eric, who would have put movement in its branches early on as the young tree was growing.
Nevertheless, Eric noted the tree’s good qualities, including its foliage and some nice movement in the trunk. Other observations from Eric and club members: no deadwood or shari. Two main trunks are two equal in size. Junipers should not develop as one big round tube; its cross section should have irregularities.
Eric asked - Anyone have a suggestion for the first thing to change? After some audience discussion he explained that because the right branch is thick and straight, almost equal in size to the trunk, it needs some kind of work. Cut off? Jin? Some liked keeping the branch, others wanted to keep a small branch branching off of that branch and jinning the rest. Eric saw no possibilities for leaving it to grow. It would destroy the illusion of size. It’s our first opportunity to develop some shari. Also, he will not keep the short branch coming off of that branch, though some had wanted to keep at least that much. Eric removed the branch, leaving a stub.
Rarely on a juniper will he cut flush with the trunk. Junipers don’t heal over wounds but will have remnants of deadwood. Eric began to carve down the stub with hand tools, creating jin and shari. This juniper needs more irregularity in the trunk. Key is to generate fibers as you reduce the thickness of the branch, peeling with pliers and pulling fibers, resulting in grain and fiber that look pretty rough but without tool marks.
Now instead of two equal sized trunks, one is thinner than the other, more bonsai-like. Eric references trees we may view in the Sierras or Point Lobos at Carmel or Carson Pass, which have these features. What is this tree missing that we admire in Kokufu trees?: size, age, maturity of bark, deadwood and shari, twists, taper. Eric: irregularities, especially in cross section of the trunk.
Having completed the jin and shari, Eric noted what was obvious - that the tree still has too many branches.
Exercise: Follow the tall branches down to see what are the different possible trunk lines, mentally deleting all the other branches to see what is most interesting. Two possibilities for trunk line. One branch is straighter and taller; the other if chosen would yield a shorter tree.
The tall straight branch has more movement with different front and could be worked into more movement with time. Question: how much does root structure/nebari help determine front and trunk line? Eric: not as important in junipers. Much talk about which would be better, the taller or shorter option? Or should we keep them both and wait for more development?
Now he asked the audience if we had any thoughts of the kind of style it will develop into? After more discussion he explained why it will probably have to be an informal upright. That lead to a discussion about how much of the excess foliage needed to be removed to move into refinement. But since this tree will be used for more demos in the future, Eric elects to leave the longer branch for a taller bonsai, at least at this point in its development.
This makes it possible also to develop a long jin from the taller material. (Great fun in the evening about developing a long jin! Eric was reading the crowd.) Thus begins the discussion of not moving into styling and refinement of this material but setting the tree up for more development. Eric removes small spindly branches but leaves some of the scruffy shorter growth that with the proper light may be useful down the line. Eric removes about 50% of the foliage, primarily because it is blocking the light. He then wires to add movement and twists, no matter what the future may be of the branch, as jin or branch. Eric is thinking long-term, retaining branches that will help develop the trunk for now but that may be removed or turned into jin later. May need to regrow branches from the much smaller growth we are retaining, not cleaning out as we usually do if we are styling or refining a juniper
After the break Eric completed much of the wiring during the break. He began by explaining best placement of branches: not vertical because it shades interior branches or interior part of the branch. Branches should be laid horizontal. Tips at the end may come up a little but hormones that the tip is producing only go down. Hormones in effect puddle at the lowest part of the branch and inhibit growth. He discussed what he calls the hierarchy of setting branches, trying to harmonize the angles of descent of the branches. Most branches that are wired and bent down will not be in the final composition, but they are kept now to make interior grow vigorously. Will take three to five years to get this tree to show condition.
Question about pot for development of this tree? From this current pot let it escape-root into the ground or plant directly in the ground.
Eric recommended Taiwan bonsai artists Min Hsuan Lo and Cheng Cheng for juniper development. Min Hsun Lo for is incremental developmental work, and Cheng Cheng for fiber pulling on jins. His 2-volume book on junipers is excellent. They both focus on juniper growing and development, rather than on styling and refinement.
Eric shared his own frustration when he was first beginning to work on bonsai that so much published material was on maintaining and refining well developed trees. Growing techniques are less well documented. He is himself a grower, developing some trees from seed.
Fertilizer: Eric uses BioGold, though it’s the most expensive, because it’s the only organic fertilizer that isn’t eaten by rats. He observed that having to replace fertilizer that walked away made BioGold cheaper. Eric thinks we overthink fertilizer.
Eric’s final advice: he wouldn’t propagate this particular juniper because we don’t know what kind it is.
Eric has a recent video on Junipers, working with nursery material: The One Mistake All Bonsai Beginners Make: Here's How to Avoid It!
Recommended Videos
Go Big in 2023! Here are three videos by bonsai professionals who do not hesitate to go big, whether on a small tree that undergoes a big bend or large trees that need taming. Do you hesitate to acquire and work on such materials because you don’t know what in the heck to do with them? These videos are for you. Technical focus is on big bends but there is so much more here to learn from the pros.
Demonstration for the Bonsai Association Belgium Trophy
This may be my favorite bonsai video. What will, what can David Benavente do with this impossible, tall, gangly pine? Difficult material transformed before your eyes. In this demonstration, he creates deadwood with hand tools and torch, then hollows out a section of the long trunk with a Makita die grinder, wraps, and, with rebar, bends to the back then down to the left. He splits crotches of big branches to bend them into a more compact shape. Lots of bending, guy wires, strength of human muscle—all required to place the branches. And lots of finger work to refine the image. Stay with this video, it gets better and better.
How to Trunk Bend a Field-Grown Pine Bonsai
This relatively small Japanese white pine with a thick trunk looks quite good even before Ryan begins to work on it. He uses the wedge technique, rebar, and a jack to make a bend in the short stout trunk. Always a perfectionist, Ryan runs into an overbite problem that he needs to correct, which he does with persistence and patience and his refined technical skills. He then proceeds to style the tree with his usual attention to details. He goes big on a small tree!
Bonsai Demonstration European Bonsai San, Saulieu, France
Taming the Dragon. A team of South Korean bonsai professionals styles this wild pine using all kinds of contraptions, including a ratchet hoist-like mechanism to execute drastic and dramatic bends.
Newsletter Editor: Jenn Tan