wildwoodbonsai: English Elm raft.

Friday, June 3, 2011

English Elm raft.

I have collected a few really good English Elms over the years, from this very ordinary looking field bank. The farmer that owned the land had spent many years cutting whatever grew there, down to the ground. Whatever survived this action, had no chioce but to grow through and along the grass.

You should have seen the grin on me chops when this one popped out. Talk about chuffed. As it happens this Elm had so much root, I put it straight in this Albright pot and let it grow away for the year. This picture was taken the following year after its first styling in 2009.

Beginning of June 2011 and its been fed strongly and left to grow and thicken. Time for the second working over the weekend. More to follow.

This is as far as I've got so far but have some time to prune and wire on Friday.

Spent the day wiring and styling today, dodging the showers. Knowing me I'll probably spend the next few days tweaking the placement. June 2011

Ruler added for scale. width of raft is about 18". Teh buds are swelling now.

Even though very little was pruned away, there are buds popping everywhere on the trunks. This has to be down to stronger feeding. Will post some more when its in leaf

And now back in leaf and growing strongly. July 2011

Cleared out a lot of unwanted shoots today to direct energy back to where its needed.

Summer 2012. Some thinning bt back branches left in leaf to thicken.

Winter 2012 and all the leaves have dropped. You can see the extended branches towards the back of the tree that were left in leaf when the rest of the tree was defoliated

The ramification is improving well now but in order to maintain a good image, the trunks and branches need cutting back now and then. This allows you to gain better character, taper and closer budding. I will use wire as little as possible from now on as clip and grow is a far more convincing way to build trees.