martine connor wrote:I don't think I could possibly leave it I the bowl of water for 10 minutes! its surely its bound to drown! :
No, It absolutely would not. So do it please.
While your mini dunks have been very effective in keeping the surface of the soil wet enough to mold, If your rootball is as compacted and solid I suspect it is... I doubt the moisture has fully penetrated into the mass of it.
It is akin to tying to grill a steak ten seconds at a time and wondering why the outside is burnt but the middle is not cooked at all.
What causes a tree to drowned [It actually suffocates but that is beside the point.] is
weeks on end of eternal wetness where it gets no oxygen. Not a 10 minute dunk.
ive had my bonsai for about 4 months now and I have only ever left it in for 10-20 seconds and it hasnt died yet so surely I mus be doin somthing right?
True, [But your watering is
not one of those 'somethings'] It is also true that there is a difference between doing ' right enough for it to survive' and doing it
right.
how do we even know it is root bound?
Only going on the information you have given:IE:
1.]
my bonsai seems to be coming out of its pot,
The roots are pushing it up out of the pot. Because they are out of room.
2.]Also the fact that you seem to have little to no water penetration {no bubbles, also the top staying constantly wet-And molding}.
3.] Add to that your statement below that
you can't even get it out of the pot...
Post several pictures please.
im too scared to pull it out of the pot once I tried but it just looked as the the small section that the base of the tree was atttched to was going to come out, not the whole of the roots in the square pot like it shows you in the books. I scared

Try running a knife around the inside edge of the pot to help loosen it up.
Cold hard fact ahead:
Being scared does nothing to resolve the situation and it won't fix itself. It will only get worse until you make it better.
Waiting for those pictures...
ynot