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Ok so I bought 2 trees from Wal-Mart garden center. These are my first bonsai and I wanted to start out with trees that weren't crazy expensive. Anyway one if them is very easily identified as a fukien tea tree. The other I thought was a Chinese elm but the leaf shape/pattern isn't consistent with that. So I've compared it to all the pictures in the id your tree section with no luck. I'm hoping that someone here will recognise their shape and can tell me what it is. I don't want to do a whole lot with or to it until I know. I don't want to cause it harm unknowingly - being new at this I'll probably make enough mistakes but I don't want assuming it's species to be one of them! Thank you in advance - any and all help is greatly appreciated

The image I tried to attach to my original post was too large - hopefully this one will work!

Welcome to the forum.

That would be a Fukien tea - so I now wonder what the other plant is...

Thank you Auk -
Maybe they both are the same, however the other one has the dark shiny leaves and tiny white flowers exactly like all the pictures Ive seen online - this one has light green leaves and no flowers which was why I thought it was different. The trunk/bark color and consistency on both is almost identical however. Perhaps this tree is less mature? I will try and get a picture of both together and post it - after I shrink the heck out of it so it will attach

Well now I can see in my close up photo what I couldn't see just looking at the 2 together - other than the difference in color the leaves have the same shape and texture. They will need some pruning but I thought they might be good for learning on before I buy a tree that a coworker friend has lovingly grown up from a seed. I appreciate the help very much as I never would have thought to use photos to capture the textures and compare them to each other. And yes there are 2 trees in that one pot but they have less trunk density than the dark leafed tree. Do you think I should put them in a larger pot for awhile and prune to encourage more lateral growth ?

imadragonkeeper wrote: Well now I can see in my close up photo what I couldn't see just looking at the 2 together -

Well, both "Dreams" seems to be doing good; "Goodness", however, is not looking so good...
Do you keep them by the window where the pictures were taken? There is not enough light for them over there.
The soil seems to be made of pebbles glued together and there is fake dry moss to "decorate". Both are not good for your trees.

There is much more light from that window in the afternoon. I just got the trees Sat evening and before I start messing with them I wanted to let them acclimate to their new surroundings. The "glued together pebbles" and fake moss are just sitting on top as decorations, underneath is better soil but I do plan to pull them from their pots, check root systems and blend some fired clay into the soil and then repot them. However being new I don't want to jump right in and do these things immediately as I don't want to shock them. Both trees need pruning rather desperately, but again I want to make sure they seem to be doing okay before I do any of that. I may move them to the guest bedroom as it has windows on 2 sides and gets a ton of sunshine for most of the day both direct and indirect so it will be a better spot than where they are now, plus much less traffic and less likelihood of them being disturbed by visiting children.

From another post I see you live in MIssouri. Why not put them outside for the summer where they can thrive now that it is summer? When there is a threat of going below 50 deg F then bring them in but you want them outside as much as they can be. Use your best window only once it is too cold outside.