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I received a beautiful bonsai tree today as a Christmas gift. I've been interested in them, but never really researched anything about them. I have a few concerns.

The first is on the exact identification of the beautiful baby. I'm not sure if it's a juniper, and if so what specific juniper it might be.

Here are a few photos:









Also, I value other's opinions on the matter. So, I have a few questions to ask.

1. About how young is this fella?

2. When should I re-pot him? The pot he is in now has no drain hole, so I am definitely worried about over watering him.

3. Is lots of sunlight acceptable?

4. Should I allow him to grow without wiring until early Spring; or should I wire him now to train the base of the tree to grow up?

5. Any suggestions on pruning now, if so what would be acceptable? Or, should I allow it to run free until Spring?


Thank you in advance for any help, advice and/or opinions any of you may offer me.

Sincerely,

Carl

名媛直播Carl92 wrote: I received a beautiful bonsai tree today as a Christmas gift. I've been interested in them, but never really researched anything about them. I have a few concerns.

I appreciate you like your gift, but it hasn't got much to do with bonsai. It's just a young juniper with some fancy decorative stuff.

1. About how young is this fella?

About 3 years.

2. When should I re-pot him? The pot he is in now has no drain hole, so I am definitely worried about over watering him.

ASAP

3. Is lots of sunlight acceptable?

Yes - and note this plant cannot be kept indoors.

4. Should I allow him to grow without wiring until early Spring; or should I wire him now to train the base of the tree to grow up?

Don't wire it.

5. Any suggestions on pruning now, if so what would be acceptable? Or, should I allow it to run free until Spring?

Don't prune it.

First learn to keep it alive. Repot it, and remove the stones and the dead moss. Next leave it alone for at least a year.

I understand that bonsai is an art form. It is more than just a tree planted in a little pot. I've checked your posts around the forum and I understand you like to make a point of this. I mean no disrespect, I admire your enthusiasm. Thank you for appreciating my gift with me.

On the other hand, is the size of the pot I place it in after this essential? I want it to be the style that hangs down. (The exact name of the style beats me right now.)

So, right now I need to take a step back and not worry about training something I don't know how to take care of. This is what I am gathering from you.

What I am confused about, is the mini directions that came with this particular tree said to keep it indoors. Why do you say different?

名媛直播Carl92 wrote: I understand that bonsai is an art form. It is more than just a tree planted in a little pot. I've checked your posts around the forum and I understand you like to make a point of this.

I do. It's almost Christmas, and that means we will be seeing lots of little plants again - and it also means that in a month or so, we will getting loads of questions about dead or dying plants.

On the other hand, is the size of the pot I place it in after this essential? I want it to be the style that hangs down. (The exact name of the style beats me right now.)

Cascading style / Semi-cascade (Kengai / Han-kengai).
You have a long way to go before you have material that you can work on. This plant will need lots of growth first, and it must be very healthy before you start training it. You could probably start wiring and bending the trunk, but I recommend to first let it get used to its new environment.

The size of the pot isn't important yet, it can go into a bigger pot - as said, you'll need growth.

So, right now I need to take a step back and not worry about training something I don't know how to take care of.

Indeed. The majority of these trees die because their owners cannot wait, want to repot, prune, wire and bend it. This is a young tree, it is not ready for it (apart from that, most trees don't like it when you do all of these techniques at once).

The drainage hole is important so that is why I do recommend to repot.

What I am confused about, is the mini directions that came with this particular tree said to keep it indoors. Why do you say different?

Because I don't lie to sell a product. People often ask for trees to grow indoors. Junipers are NOT indoor plants. Essentially, there is no such thing as an indoor tree.

Tomorrow I will try to get a new pot for it. I kind of checked around about fertilizer.

I have gathered that I should use regular potting soil and a liquid fertilizer of NPK(7-5-6). But am at a loss of concentrate for anything other than nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium. Any comments on this?

Also, how about any particular way to re-pot except for just being careful with the roots?

P.S. I think the little structure is pretty cool, so I want to keep that. But I will get rid of the rocks and moss.

HI,

welcome to the forum.

For repotting, you would ideally not use regular potting soil. Although plants grow in them plants can also effectively drown in them. Some plants like their roots to be surrounded by lots of organic material, that stays very wet for a long time. Junipers do not.

I have all my trees in very coarse, very open substrate, similar to tennis court gravel.

When repotting, it is surprising how much of the roots you can take off without the plant dying -although I do not recomment you trying-. Keep as much of the roots as possible. If you remove roots, do so with sharp trimmmers; Rough cuts make for bad healing cuts which increases the risk of infection.

Repotting a tree for bonsai is very different fro repotting a regular houseplant. Look at some video's online. I would bet Graham Potter has a good one on repotting.

What LB said, and yes, you can keep the little structure.

Here is the repotted juniper.