Bonsai-Novice
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Japanese Maple questions

Hi, I've a Japanese Maple.
It's in its younger stages and had a while to go before it can have any serious work done on it. It's the season to repot but how do I know if it needs repotting?
What kind of pot? Regular plastic or a ceramic shallow pot?
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rainbowgardener
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You do not have a japanese maple bonsai. You have a japanese maple seedling in a pot. The art of bonsai is to create a miniature tree that gives the illusion of being a big old tree, shrunk down.

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One of the main things that helps create that illusion is a trunk that is thick relative to the tree and has a lot of taper. There is a guideline (not a rule, but a rule of thumb that gives some guidance) that says the height of a finished bonsai should be about six times the diameter of the trunk at the base. Since your trunk looks to be maybe 1/4 " in diameter, you could only have a bonsai an inch and a half tall.

So what you need to do is put it in a large nursery pot and let it grow out for a few years and gain some trunk girth.

If you trim all the roots down and put your little seedling in a bonsai pot now, it will not gain more girth, or next to never...

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Hi, thanks for information.
Nowhere did I claim this to be a bonsai, I'm aware this is a seedling stage plant.
What size nursery pot?

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rainbowgardener
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I would start with one gallon for now and up pot to bigger later as the tree grows....

I know it is counter intuitive to think about big pots to make a bonsai tree, but bonsai is the art of patience. You will spend some years just letting it grow.

If you want to practice bonsai skills now, you can find a tree or shrub in your yard or somewhere being removed or for sale (at the end of the season there's lots of trees and shrubs being sold off cheap) and pot it up and work on cutting it down. Or you can buy a pre-bonsai tree that has had its first shaping but is still in a nursery pot. There's a number of bonsai websites that sell pre-bonsai pretty inexpensive, like around $20-30, e.g. https://wigertsbonsai.com/store/index.ph ... x&cPath=66

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Awesome, thanks heaps!

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LatoDavid
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I have a Japanese Red Maple bonsai. Have had it three years. Lost leaves over the winter and got beautiful new leaves a few months ago. Now quite a few of the leaves are turning brown and drying up. Can anyone help me?

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All I can think is, potential sun damage on young leaves or watering?

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rainbowgardener
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LatoDavid wrote:I have a Japanese Red Maple bonsai. Have had it three years. Lost leaves over the winter and got beautiful new leaves a few months ago. Now quite a few of the leaves are turning brown and drying up. Can anyone help me?
Pictures always help!

And you really need to tell us where you are located. The fact that your maple put out new leaves "a few months ago" sounds like you are somewhere in the southern hemisphere? Here in the north, they would probably just be leafing out now.

So how late are you in your season, spring, summer, fall?

At my previous house, I had a gorgeous Japanese maple tree, not bonsai, full sized. In the spring, it would put out beautiful, perfect, dramatically colored leaves. But over the course of the season, they get sunburned or attacked in various ways. By mid-summer-ish they would be faded and get spotty. It's a natural aging process. By fall, the tree is going to lose those leaves anyway. The following spring there will be beautiful new ones again.

Image

Don't know if this is what you are talking about. But if you give us pictures and location, you can get a better answer.

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Hi, I've since found it was simply sun damage and summer leaves going through there natural process

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rainbowgardener
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I think that's what I said: But over the course of the season, they get sunburned or attacked in various ways. By mid-summer-ish they would be faded and get spotty. It's a natural aging process.



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