Can Any Plant be Used for Bonsai?

[Beecmcneil]

Can any plant be used in the art of bonsai? I assume this will have a not so quick answer.
Bee.

[tomc]

It depends on how you translate the characters (bon) and (tsai), tree and tray respectively.

Some folks are going to reply ernestly that if it aint a tree inna tray, it aint bonsai. it might be an accent plant, but not bonsai.

Others equally ernestly are going to tell you if the plant has been trained into tree shape with work being done to increase ramification and a root structure to look tree-like, its close enough.

Seeing as nobody really needs to devote the number of hours in creation of and continued care of a tree in a tray. Disrespect his-her devotion at your peril. They might drop a pot on your foot.

IMO vines like grape might not be "bonsai", but they adapt and leaves reduce in trays quite nicely. So even if they're only an accent plant, I likes 'em. An' that'll have to do.

[tomc]

Smarter guys than me have offered this:

Its not about making a tree look like bonsai, its about making bonsai look like a tree.

[rainbowgardener]

If you take tom's definition then a wide range of things can be treated as bonsai. But not really anything. It pretty much needs to have a long life span - nothing you can do with a petunia in one season to give it artistry and aged/ tree like appearance. It pretty much needs to have a woody stem. And it needs to have smallish leaves to be in proportion with the miniaturized form. Pawpaw trees for example, meet the first two criteria, but their leaves are a yard long and would look stupid on a small tree.

Here's a selection of non-tree bonsai:


https://absolutebonsai.com/yahoo_site_ad ... 51_std.jpg

wisteria vine bonsai



https://bonsaikid.files.wordpress.com/20 ... nzn_ph.jpg

azalea bonsai


https://dupuich.smugmug.com/Bonsai/Exhib ... w-28-S.jpg

ivy vine bonsai

[tomc]

Now I think the last three of rainbows offerings are lovely and give the vision of maturity. I think they're woody stemmed enough to be great tree-babies.

Oh you can search red and black pines in long training that give the impression of great age. Some of them are as old as they look.

The grower(s) who loved either set devoted rapt attention to their tree(s).

[manofthetrees]

surprized no one mentioned mums, it is a stretch to even compare them to being trees ,but I have seen some amazing tree looking mums "bonsaied"

[Beecmcneil]

So is that a no?
?
Bee

[rainbowgardener]

To me it is a no, not ANYTHING, but yes, many things.

Manofthetrees, I had never heard of chrysanthemum bonsai, so I went looking. To me it seems like another one of those things like the poinsettia bonsai someone else wrote in about. It can be done, but not necessarily real successfully. Here's what I thought was one of the best of the images I found:



https://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/yuyan ... window.jpg

I'm suspecting the mums are perhaps grafted on to that massive trunk. Even so, everything seems a little disproportionate. Many of the images I found had big flowers on spindly trunks....

[Beecmcneil]

What are some common plants I can bonsai? Err... Turn into bonsai?.... Ugh... What is the term I should use?

[tomc]

No, photo-shopped mums are accent plants.

Bea, inasmuch as your in California, one state blessed with more bonsai clubs than any other. You can get excelent local advice.

Where you live I expect if you are a dilligent forager you could collect any of the following: peach. plum. olive. crab. apple, blueberry, quince, pomegranite, juniper, as they are being removed for remodeling. For free. Free-cycle and craigs list are excelent resource.

Any stump you do collect will go into a training pot for some years before being set out in a bonsai pan.

Other late late comers to my plant list: citrus, live oak, box.

[imafan26]

The art of bonsai I understand is to try to create a miniature version of nature in a pot.

The plants do have to be long lived and have roots and branches that tolerate pruning and slow growing.

Small leaved plants look the best when trying to miniaturize. The whole thing should be proportional, leaf size to trunk and tree to pot.

The plants that I have most commonly seen are junipers, mugo pine, jade plants, geometry trees, banyans. Flowering and fruiting trees : kinsai orange, cherry banyon, figs, and dwarf pomegranates.

I have also seen topiary that is called bonsai like azalea and gardenia.

In Japan, for the annual chrysanthemum festival, chrysanthemums are grown and trained for years to achieve amazing blooming specimens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9bz8iCH ... GPceIDaS3L

[Beecmcneil]

Thanks imafan and tomc those were very helpful posts!
Bee

[tomc]

Bea a scrap bush in south Texas so it might be viable out of doors in south California is pithecellobium flexicaule (Texas Ebony).

Its one of only a few I might reccomend that you may have to buy an example of. Of all the leguminous woody perrenials, This one is knees and ankles above the rest

In my biased opinion it does all the things a plant lover could want in one pot. It blooms, closes its leaves up at night, is naturaly contorted, and has the smallest leaves of any leguminous tree.

[manofthetrees]

I'm suspecting the mums are perhaps grafted on to that massive trunk.

I think its like a pheonix graft for the large trunks . ive seen some spectacular root over rock ones but none with substantial trunks . their is a certain species that is used that has small flowers and doesnt die back in winter but I have been hard pressed to find out the name... sorry for the tread hijack

[tomc]

I think the mums were photo-shopped.

[imafan26]

I've seen them prep the mums for display. Each petal of each mum is positioned by hand.

[manofthetrees]

no tom they are grow like this ive seen a few good examples in person.it was quite a few years before my bonsai obsession started so I didnt ask questions that I would have today

[rainbowgardener]

What are some common plants I can bonsai? Err... Turn into bonsai?.... Ugh... What is the term I should use?

As far a common non-tree plants that can be treated as bonsai, any kind of woody shrub with smallish leaves that grows in your neighborhood would be a good place to start. I currently have a burning bush shrub that was 4 feet tall when I dug it out of a flower bed, that I am (slowly) working on turning in to bonsai.

It has a considerably thicker stem/ "trunk" than a real tree that height (like a maple tree or something) would have, which is a good thing for bonsai.