I've learned health first then, roots, then structure. Been in the hobby for less than a decade. None of my trees come close to refinement stage, but that's okay with me. We often forget the journey is the most important part of our hobby as there's no true destination, just rest stops along the way. Great reminder my friend.
This is a very wise and much needed video. Thank you, Eric! This is by far the most common mistake beginners make. And - I hate to say it - sometimes it's driven by more experienced bonsaists who push the youngsters: " just cut it, cut it all, cut all the roots, you can squeeze it into this tiny container, no problem! Look, now you got a bonsai!". This is how the head of my bonsai club it promoting it done. "It's a nursery stock material, it will grow like crazy, trust me!" And guess what? It doesn't! They die. I killed so many. Or they just stagnate. They sit in those containers, with no new growth, then they get sick, they start to die back, and then they die altogether. One can learn from their own mistakes. Or they can listen to wisdom of others. I have a different question: where do you get those training pots? Those wide but relatively shallow (terracotta?) pots that you are repotting into? Terracotta pots from the garden centers are too deep. Thanks in advance!
Glad you enjoyed it. They are Japanese terra cotta. Jonas imports them to the US, but they're hard to ship so I buy them in bulk, but I also don't ship them after a few disastrous attempts.
Your video is one of the single most concise and insightful videos for explanation of creating bonsai that I’ve seen. It’s taken me 3 years to realize what you’ve shared with us in a couple minutes. Excellent, thank you!
Spot on! Good to hear the ‘correct path of potting’ for development. Bench esthetics in displaying developing trees can be improved by using the same type of pots. Thank you for this video and important discussion.👍
Thank you so much for this explanation of the benefits of not rushing the trees. I think I’m sure I’ve lost more than a few plants by downsizing the pots instead of up sizing.
This! I'll be upotting a bunch of trees i put into small pots too soon. They just stopped developing before they reached their potential. Thanks for the video!
I love Anderson flats. I will use a 2-4 inch hole saw and cut out circles from 1/4 inch plexiglass. I put the plexiglass right under the base of the grow stock, plant it in the flat and let it go. The root flare I get from this is usually spectacular. The plexiglass forces all the roots out then down.
I've bought lots of plants from Bonsaify, but this is the first time I've watched a video! And I just recently realized that I can't stick any old tree in a small pot and expect to get anywhere. You put in a small pot to slow the growth down. So most of mine have moved into larger pots for development. I worry about the Japanese Black Pines though, that a too big a pot will hold too much moisture and pines just won't tolerate wet roots. I have my two starter black pines from your shop in 6"x 4" tall pots with my usual akadama lava pumice mix.
Absolutely true. If the tree is not matured needs a lot room for development. But fır fine ramifications you need to contain the tree with smaller root space.
Excellent Eric! Such a simple concept that is often overlooked or ignored. I came to this conclusion a while back by killing too many trees!!! Good stuff.
Thank you for sharing this. Just like anything worthwhile, once you get passed the honeymoon phase the real work begins. Its rarely a matter of just a pretty pot.
This is very helpful to me thanks for the explanation, I put my favorite developing trees in my best small pots, not realizing that this may restrict the growth
Yeah, to be honest. Generally speaking my plants stay in very large pots compared to bonsai pots. I know it’s not the purest way of doing things, but between our summer heat and my work schedule it tends to be better for me and the plants.
A few years into this and it's a balancing act I'm still contending with. Most trees that I've put in bonsai pots came back out. I think it was still good repotting practice, but getting good primary and even secondary branches in a small pot is pretty tedious. I often fear losing control of the structural roots in large pots, but I'm finding that a trim every year or two - in combination with things like discs - is often enough to prevent anything from getting out of hand. I also became an instant fan of Tom Fincel's top down repotting technique for managing nebari while maintaining the inertia of a tree, even if I'm not quite ready to start down-potting it.
Using bulb and azelea pots helps prevent that downward growth of the roots, they are much cheaper than the Tokoname pots, you just need a bench that is drainable since they don't have feet. Clay stays damp so the roots grow outward towards the rim, they don't do that in plastic.
This is what I have been learning about recently. Great video and loved seeing the progression in pot sizing to development stage. Excellent visual! I too have made the mistake of going small immediately. Looking for how best to “up pot” and still fit my space available. Excellent video.. thanks so much!
Great advice- I have about 30 trees and only 4 of them are in bonsai pots. To develop a tree that you want this is the fastest way - more growth = more options for design and better health.
Thanks, it took me a good while to recognize this. I suspect that many bonsai hobbyists have made the mistake of thinking a special tree was ready for a special small pot too early in its development. Enjoy your presentations very much.
Your videos mean so much to me please never give up and please continue to make videos. If I was in the states I would happily support your nursery and buy a lot of your trees unfortunately I’m in Australia so shipping trees to me even if you could wouldn’t work they would probably die in shipping or die from shock of difference in weather and climate. I love your information and videos mate keep it up
Excellent video Eric. I am lucky to learn these things at year 2 instead of year 20. I only wish the image at 9:08 got a little more screen time and explanation.
I tried a ground growing experiment this year. One maple sapling went directly into the ground, the other went into a 1 gallon pot. The ground grown one is twice as thick as the pot grown one after a year. So all my maples are going into the ground next year.
Excellent video! Best explanation I've watched about getting more growth quicker and thickening the trunk or nabari. I've only been doing bonsai about 2 months and yes we get excited to put our trees, ready or not in a bonsai pot. Patience lol Thank you!!!
Hi Eric, this was a really good video. I would like to up pot some trees for their health. I have several of your black pines up potted in pond baskets in coir and perlite. When up potting larger trees do you use the usual mix 1-1-1?
It depends on what I'm up to - if I'm growing out pines in larger containers I've been using lava-bark-perlite-coco more recently. I use APL 1-1-1 on more mature trees when I'm potting down or moving into refinement.
When would you switch, or rather what's the difference, pros and cons between plastic nursery containers compared to the same size terracotta training pot??
The difference between plastic and other containers is marginal for most species. Size is more important than the material that the container is made of. Although small-ish pond baskets dry out so quickly that they slow things down. Fabric grow bags act like terra cotta in that they're porous, but they're better because they don't cause root circling.
When you bonsai a plant it is always best to do your research on the horticulture side of things when a person says "bonsai plant" that is over 100,000 different species of plants each one likes a certain soil certain lighting certain humidity each plant is unique in their own way learn about the plant before you train the plant into a bonsai don't just rush into things I have half of my plants in 5-7 gallon grow bags growing for months wild wild you don't need a bonsai pot to make a bonsai It's just a decorative touch People grow their bonsai trees in large rocks some grow them in water some are grown on a slab of stone found along a beach or river I've even seen a bonsai plant grown in just a piece of drift wood only When you train a plant you imprint your own image into it You don't have to be like everyone else because this plant is not for everyone else Remember that!
Your bonsai look great ❤ I have found a very small, Picea schrenkiana/ Asian Spruce. When i try to find more info on how to use this tree, i dont turn up with many answers to help. Is this type of tree not good for bonsai? Not sure if it has a more common name in the Bonsai World? Any advice on this type of sprce would be appreciated 🙏🏻
Never heard of it until this comment. But spruce are not super common in general. Ezo spruce are used, but most of the ones in japan are collected (and they're not used for shohin for some reason.) Picea orientalis is a good species so far for me, but Picea Glenhii is the best explored. In the US there are a lot of people using the Colorado Blue spruce collected trees and also the Black Hills spruce which is a smaller-needle sub-variety of the same species.
As in everything, styles come and go. It's time for the tiny pots to go. Looking back on old Japanese paintings, bonsai were planted in enormous pots by today's standards. So, bigger pots ARE traditional. Trees LOVE bigger pots. All of mine are in "too big" pots and they like it that way.
Hi sir! I have a couple of young Itoigawa junipers (1 year old rooted cuttings) and plan on just doing clip and grow and guy wires on them. Would that work?
Yes, but that's like asking if painting with a brush will work. And I would note that training junipers is very slow in general - so slowing it further by not using regular wiring technique will probably more than double the development time. 🤷♂️.
As a typical beginner I have a few seedlings in tiny bonsai pots that I intend to keep small, reason being I don't understand the balance of growing the plant and being sure I can fit the roots in a small pot later. Any tips? bc I still want a thick trunk relative to the container
You have to be able to cut roots with confidence to make larger trunks fit in smaller containers...that's just part of bonsai. Escape rooting can help with shaping roots to a small container size while not causing other problems.
@Bonsaify I have black and scots pines seedlings end of first growing season. Potted into tiny pots with aka and pumice for super tiny plants in fall. What should I do, pot them up in spring?
They will grow fast in 4" containers or 1 gallon size or larger. With pines specifically, growing them slow for the first couple years can be beneficial, shortening nodes. But at some point potting them up to fatten the trunk is going to save you a decade of waiting...
Humble beginnings make the best things. Trees in bigger pots help develop your trees. If you pitted then into a small bonsai pot too early the growth would slow down a lot. Taking a 5 year tree to 15 years of development
I use regular plant pots. Can get some very pretty ones 😁 Not traditional but I don't care since larger pots retain more water which means they don't dry out as fast. Much less maintaince much easier to care for. Don't get me started on "bonsai soil"
So, you put a redwood in a tiny pot, and then made a video telling everyone to "stop doing this"? :) Maybe start with yourself. I have several dozen redwood and would never dream of putting this species in such a small pot. Seems rather obvious.
I've learned health first then, roots, then structure. Been in the hobby for less than a decade. None of my trees come close to refinement stage, but that's okay with me.
We often forget the journey is the most important part of our hobby as there's no true destination, just rest stops along the way.
Great reminder my friend.
This is a very wise and much needed video. Thank you, Eric! This is by far the most common mistake beginners make. And - I hate to say it - sometimes it's driven by more experienced bonsaists who push the youngsters: " just cut it, cut it all, cut all the roots, you can squeeze it into this tiny container, no problem! Look, now you got a bonsai!". This is how the head of my bonsai club it promoting it done. "It's a nursery stock material, it will grow like crazy, trust me!" And guess what? It doesn't! They die. I killed so many. Or they just stagnate. They sit in those containers, with no new growth, then they get sick, they start to die back, and then they die altogether. One can learn from their own mistakes. Or they can listen to wisdom of others.
I have a different question: where do you get those training pots? Those wide but relatively shallow (terracotta?) pots that you are repotting into? Terracotta pots from the garden centers are too deep. Thanks in advance!
Glad you enjoyed it. They are Japanese terra cotta. Jonas imports them to the US, but they're hard to ship so I buy them in bulk, but I also don't ship them after a few disastrous attempts.
Your video is one of the single most concise and insightful videos for explanation of creating bonsai that I’ve seen. It’s taken me 3 years to realize what you’ve shared with us in a couple minutes. Excellent, thank you!
Spot on! Good to hear the ‘correct path of potting’ for development. Bench esthetics in displaying developing trees can be improved by using the same type of pots. Thank you for this video and important discussion.👍
Thank you so much for this explanation of the benefits of not rushing the trees. I think I’m sure I’ve lost more than a few plants by downsizing the pots instead of up sizing.
The smaller of the first 2 specimens is aesthetic nice one ERIC.
This! I'll be upotting a bunch of trees i put into small pots too soon. They just stopped developing before they reached their potential. Thanks for the video!
I love Anderson flats. I will use a 2-4 inch hole saw and cut out circles from 1/4 inch plexiglass. I put the plexiglass right under the base of the grow stock, plant it in the flat and let it go. The root flare I get from this is usually spectacular. The plexiglass forces all the roots out then down.
solid vid, loved the start to finish progression line up at the end
Time and patience is everything in bonsai.
@7:00 beautiful structure on the JM
I've bought lots of plants from Bonsaify, but this is the first time I've watched a video! And I just recently realized that I can't stick any old tree in a small pot and expect to get anywhere. You put in a small pot to slow the growth down. So most of mine have moved into larger pots for development. I worry about the Japanese Black Pines though, that a too big a pot will hold too much moisture and pines just won't tolerate wet roots. I have my two starter black pines from your shop in 6"x 4" tall pots with my usual akadama lava pumice mix.
Great video. It took me two years to understand the message in your video. Patience I’ve learned is something bonsai has help me develop.
thank you so much for the content, i always enjoy your videos !
Absolutely true. If the tree is not matured needs a lot room for development. But fır fine ramifications you need to contain the tree with smaller root space.
hi friend i like your jobs , the mini is great and interesting proyects, congrats and God bless your hands👍🙏
Excellent Eric! Such a simple concept that is often overlooked or ignored. I came to this conclusion a while back by killing too many trees!!! Good stuff.
Great point! Definitely a process of give and take. I’ve lost some of my favorite trees by keeping them in ill-fitting pots
Such an inspiring and knowledgeable teacher‼️🌸🌺always learning a new faucet in the art of bonsais
Couldn’t agree more with putting trees into bonsai pots too early. It’s like putting a painting into a frame before finishing the piece.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge Sir,very much appreciated 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
Very nice Bonsai
Like 387
My friend thank you for good sharing
Thank you for sharing this. Just like anything worthwhile, once you get passed the honeymoon phase the real work begins. Its rarely a matter of just a pretty pot.
This is very helpful to me thanks for the explanation, I put my favorite developing trees in my best small pots, not realizing that this may restrict the growth
A lot of good sense. Comes down to the fact PATIENCE is all that is required.
Yeah, to be honest. Generally speaking my plants stay in very large pots compared to bonsai pots. I know it’s not the purest way of doing things, but between our summer heat and my work schedule it tends to be better for me and the plants.
Very interesting and thank you. All the best from the uk 🇬🇧
Your videos are so educational and ive learned so much. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Ive come to this realization as of late. I love tiny trees, but you are 💯
A few years into this and it's a balancing act I'm still contending with. Most trees that I've put in bonsai pots came back out. I think it was still good repotting practice, but getting good primary and even secondary branches in a small pot is pretty tedious. I often fear losing control of the structural roots in large pots, but I'm finding that a trim every year or two - in combination with things like discs - is often enough to prevent anything from getting out of hand. I also became an instant fan of Tom Fincel's top down repotting technique for managing nebari while maintaining the inertia of a tree, even if I'm not quite ready to start down-potting it.
Using bulb and azelea pots helps prevent that downward growth of the roots, they are much cheaper than the Tokoname pots, you just need a bench that is drainable since they don't have feet. Clay stays damp so the roots grow outward towards the rim, they don't do that in plastic.
I know this and still struggle making myself be patient.
I am glad I found your channel, very informative.
This is what I have been learning about recently. Great video and loved seeing the progression in pot sizing to development stage. Excellent visual!
I too have made the mistake of going small immediately. Looking for how best to “up pot” and still fit my space available. Excellent video.. thanks so much!
Such a common lesson but taught with such great example trees! Thanks Eric!
Awesome tutorial (as usual). Thanks, keep growing
Excellent Eric!
Very helpful and useful information. Thank you.
So beautiful Mr Eric.❤❤
Great advice- I have about 30 trees and only 4 of them are in bonsai pots. To develop a tree that you want this is the fastest way - more growth = more options for design and better health.
Really valuable. Many thanks!!
As a novice in this hobby, this is an excellent video, appreciate the thorough explanation
Thanks for talking through some early stage steps, a strength of this channel :) meaNs i take better care of the young plants i bought from you
Thanks, it took me a good while to recognize this. I suspect that many bonsai hobbyists have made the mistake of thinking a special tree was ready for a special small pot too early in its development. Enjoy your presentations very much.
Your videos mean so much to me please never give up and please continue to make videos. If I was in the states I would happily support your nursery and buy a lot of your trees unfortunately I’m in Australia so shipping trees to me even if you could wouldn’t work they would probably die in shipping or die from shock of difference in weather and climate.
I love your information and videos mate keep it up
Excellent video Eric. I am lucky to learn these things at year 2 instead of year 20. I only wish the image at 9:08 got a little more screen time and explanation.
Agreed. Planning to re-use or re-shoot that one for another video or perhaps a short.
Your videos are so good! Keep them coming and thank you.
I tried a ground growing experiment this year. One maple sapling went directly into the ground, the other went into a 1 gallon pot. The ground grown one is twice as thick as the pot grown one after a year. So all my maples are going into the ground next year.
Great tips. Thx!
Thanks
Great video. Great information.
Great video.
Excellent video! Best explanation I've watched about getting more growth quicker and thickening the trunk or nabari. I've only been doing bonsai about 2 months and yes we get excited to put our trees, ready or not in a bonsai pot. Patience lol Thank you!!!
good point, thank you for reminder
Thanks!
Thank you 🙏
Great info here!!!
Thanks you, amazing bonsai sir 🎉
this ... was helpful!
Sadly a lot of the beginner videos I watched when I first started insisted on planting everything into a small bonsai pot.
With cries of "it's not bonsai if it's in a *gasp* flower pot!" I think folk forget they're dealing with literal trees sometimes
Hi Eric, this was a really good video. I would like to up pot some trees for their health. I have several of your black pines up potted in pond baskets in coir and perlite. When up potting larger trees do you use the usual mix 1-1-1?
It depends on what I'm up to - if I'm growing out pines in larger containers I've been using lava-bark-perlite-coco more recently. I use APL 1-1-1 on more mature trees when I'm potting down or moving into refinement.
When would you switch, or rather what's the difference, pros and cons between plastic nursery containers compared to the same size terracotta training pot??
The difference between plastic and other containers is marginal for most species. Size is more important than the material that the container is made of. Although small-ish pond baskets dry out so quickly that they slow things down. Fabric grow bags act like terra cotta in that they're porous, but they're better because they don't cause root circling.
When you bonsai a plant it is always best to do your research on the horticulture side of things when a person says "bonsai plant" that is over 100,000 different species of plants each one likes a certain soil certain lighting certain humidity each plant is unique in their own way learn about the plant before you train the plant into a bonsai don't just rush into things
I have half of my plants in 5-7 gallon grow bags growing for months wild wild you don't need a bonsai pot to make a bonsai
It's just a decorative touch
People grow their bonsai trees in large rocks some grow them in water some are grown on a slab of stone found along a beach or river I've even seen a bonsai plant grown in just a piece of drift wood only
When you train a plant you imprint your own image into it
You don't have to be like everyone else because this plant is not for everyone else
Remember that!
Your bonsai look great ❤
I have found a very small, Picea schrenkiana/ Asian Spruce.
When i try to find more info on how to use this tree, i dont turn up with many answers to help.
Is this type of tree not good for bonsai?
Not sure if it has a more common name in the Bonsai World?
Any advice on this type of sprce would be appreciated 🙏🏻
Never heard of it until this comment. But spruce are not super common in general. Ezo spruce are used, but most of the ones in japan are collected (and they're not used for shohin for some reason.) Picea orientalis is a good species so far for me, but Picea Glenhii is the best explored. In the US there are a lot of people using the Colorado Blue spruce collected trees and also the Black Hills spruce which is a smaller-needle sub-variety of the same species.
As in everything, styles come and go. It's time for the tiny pots to go. Looking back on old Japanese paintings, bonsai were planted in enormous pots by today's standards. So, bigger pots ARE traditional. Trees LOVE bigger pots. All of mine are in "too big" pots and they like it that way.
I've slowly been realizing this myself, thank you.
Eric, what brand of pots did you use to upside the 2 trees in the video?
Japanese Terra Cotta
Where do you get the Terra cotta flower pots with the glazed lip? Darren Wong grows his Azaleas in them. I'd like to pick so up.
They are Japanese. Jonas imports them and I believe sells them locally. However neither he nor I ship them because they are pretty easy to break.
Wigerts bonsai has them is different sizes and they ship.
excellent message here. #1 mistake of people growing bonsai imo.
I agree
Hi sir! I have a couple of young Itoigawa junipers (1 year old rooted cuttings) and plan on just doing clip and grow and guy wires on them. Would that work?
Yes, but that's like asking if painting with a brush will work. And I would note that training junipers is very slow in general - so slowing it further by not using regular wiring technique will probably more than double the development time. 🤷♂️.
You should see them when you put them in the ground
As a typical beginner I have a few seedlings in tiny bonsai pots that I intend to keep small, reason being I don't understand the balance of growing the plant and being sure I can fit the roots in a small pot later. Any tips? bc I still want a thick trunk relative to the container
You have to be able to cut roots with confidence to make larger trunks fit in smaller containers...that's just part of bonsai. Escape rooting can help with shaping roots to a small container size while not causing other problems.
@Bonsaify I have black and scots pines seedlings end of first growing season. Potted into tiny pots with aka and pumice for super tiny plants in fall. What should I do, pot them up in spring?
They will grow fast in 4" containers or 1 gallon size or larger. With pines specifically, growing them slow for the first couple years can be beneficial, shortening nodes. But at some point potting them up to fatten the trunk is going to save you a decade of waiting...
@@Bonsaify Thank you!
great
Such vice words 🇩🇰🌳😎
❤❤❤
What size fabric pot was that?
Hmm. I think you mean the 3-gallon in the middle of the sequence at the end of the video? I buy them from Left Coast Bonsai.
I guess we can get excited when we start a new tree and forget training pots are a thing😂
👍
What is that container at the 6min mark of video
The juniper is in a 10" square Finofil pond basket. The maple is in a 17" Anderson deep propagation flat (which have a mesh bottom.)
Aggre too small pots not helping.. especially if you get hot days in summer.. watering can be a real issue
gj!
Thank you for saying "bone sai" not "baan zai"!
It’s more “bon sai” more emphasis on the “ON” its kind of pronounced “bONsigh” I’ve found
I'm a Guy-Jin. So "bone-sai" is as good as I can do. Every time I here "Ban-Zai" I think of Pearl Harbor.
90% of my trees are still in nursery pots 😂
Humble beginnings make the best things. Trees in bigger pots help develop your trees. If you pitted then into a small bonsai pot too early the growth would slow down a lot. Taking a 5 year tree to 15 years of development
Same
I use regular plant pots. Can get some very pretty ones 😁 Not traditional but I don't care since larger pots retain more water which means they don't dry out as fast. Much less maintaince much easier to care for. Don't get me started on "bonsai soil"
@@TheSunnyTrails or you're doing shohin
👍🙂👌
From bonsai pot to bigger container is not that easy. Trees can easily get overwatered and root will rot
No it won’t. Not if you are using the correct bonsai media and have good drainage.
So, you put a redwood in a tiny pot, and then made a video telling everyone to "stop doing this"? :) Maybe start with yourself. I have several dozen redwood and would never dream of putting this species in such a small pot. Seems rather obvious.
THIS is what's called a "teaching moment". It's made to illustrate a point.
Be kinder, ok?
if you actually watch the whole video before rushing to comment, you'd see that he is fixing that problem