Bonsai

[backtothelab]

I found this picture on my HD while looking for a new wallpaper pic. I'm not sure if it's japanese maple or marijuana, but if it is marijuana, could it still flower as a bonsai? Would I only get a small amount of bud, if it could flower?
Here's the pic:

[Kitaro]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaw, It's Sooo Cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[eccofarmer]

NAMASTE

That hand seems like i seen it before,hhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmmm.Wander were .Looks like maple leaf indica to me but just a guess i am sure.

[backtothelab]

heh, the little guy is cute, is'nt he?
I've actually done some research for anyone who's wondering, and yeah, it could be marijuana just as much as japanese maple. Apearently, you can bonsai alot of different trees, shrubs and bushes. I'm probably going to post in the gardening forum about a good starter plant to bonsai for a few years before I move onto marijuana. It does flower, btw, I just don't know how much.

[Mr_Soul]

Hmmm, I highly doubt whether it is cannabis, as I can't see the purpose behind using such a decorative, expensive ceramic pot to house it. More than likely Japanese maple from what I can gather. Having said that I could be completely wrong. It's difficult to judge from that pic. I really don't think it's maple leaf indica ecco, as it has extremely wide leaf blades to the point of being almost webbed.

Bonsaiing is a technique used in keeping mums for clones, and has no real use in the flowering phase. Having said that it would most definitely produce flowers under a 12/12 light regime.

Below I will endeavour to outline my techniques for bonsaiing mums :

Now we will deal with every aspect of the care and maintenance of Mums including root and branch pruning as well as the renovation on an old mother well past her sell by date.
"Tired of huge unwieldy mothers that take up too much space? A fully established bonsai mum only takes up 8 inches x 8 inches."

This bonsai mother, if well fed, produce 10 to 30 good cuttings every 14 days under an HID or every 20 days under fluorescent shop light. This means a 4 ft x 2 ft shoplight with 18 Mums, could produce an output of over 9500 cuttings a year.

[Mr_Soul]

We are not talking about intensive production here but it shows just how flexible and efficient the system can be. What it does for the connoisseur is allow them to keep a good selection of varieties in a relatively small space. If you don't fancy growing one for 6 months or a year it doesn't matter. All she will need is regular maintenance.

Lets start with Mumming up a plant from a rooted cutting, once again this is simple. You will find that with every batch of cuttings a few will stand out, being sturdier and generally looking better all round, pick one or two of these to make your Mums, not some wimpy left over reject. Remember this mum will provide you with cuttings 4 to 18 times a year for the next 3 to 15 years, so only the best will do. Pick a fully rooted through cutting from the plug tray and pot on into a 2.5 inch square pot. I find square pots much easier to deal with when it comes to root pruning, as you will see later.


Grow it on for a few days so it can start rooting through then trim its top back to leave 3 or 4 side shoots.

Pic 1 - an ideal cutting for making a mum
Pic 2 - trim the top
Pic 3 - a look from the top, the side shoots have been nipped back as well.

[Mr_Soul]

These little branches to be will make the main framework of your Mum. Ideally as they grow they should form an open cup shape. The top 2 will grow the fastest and when they get to about 5 inches pinch or snip out their growing tips to just above a leaf node. This will allow the second pair to catch up in a day or so, then pinch them out as well. This will encourage side shoots to form, any that grow into the central cup shaped space pinch out.

You will now have 6 to 8 leading shoots coming up. When they reach 4 to 6 inches they can be taken as your first set of cuttings. You cut them back to just above the first leaf node of the new growth. So after the cuttings have been taken the mum is only a tiny bit larger than the last time she was cut back but the main branches will be starting to get thicker.

Now is the time to move up to the next pot size and a 3 inch sq is ideal. The next set of leading shoots will tend to be 12 to 16, plus there will be others coming up from lower nodes so in total there may be 30 or more. Any really thin ones or any growing into the centre either cut back to one node or remove altogether.

[Mr_Soul]

In the picture below from the left:- [one], is the trimmed cutting from above. [two], Has had 2 sets of cuttings taken off and is more than ready to move to a 3 inch pot. As you can see it is a little short of N showing its better to move after only taking one set of cuttings. [three] in a 3 inch pot 12 cuttings have been taken with 2 left on to show where to cut back to. [four] is a five year old Mum that has just had 32 cuttings taken off and could do with some more small twiggy bits removed. She is in a 1 litre pot and has been since she was 3 months old.


Note how all have an open centre, this allows light to both the centre and the outside. It will fill in between taking cuttings but if pruned back to this form, makes better and more even growth giving more good cuttings each time. Water only is used while forming the Mums and no fertiliser. It is not until they are in their final 1 litre pots and a set or two of cuttings have been taken that feeding starts.

[Mr_Soul]

The general care and maintenance for fully formed mother plants.


The Mums need just enough fertiliser to keep them healthy. Feed of half strength fertiliser twice a month, using say a 6-2-4 fish mix as about right [its not critical]! This keeps them in good general health but doesn't over feed them. If you want faster production at any point change to a full strength feed once or twice. Every 2 to 4 weeks a new batch of cuttings are taken even if they are not needed and just put in the worm bin. You can think of it as being like having to mow the lawn and keeps the mum the same size and form for years. Because so much is taken away they can get short of macro nutrients so every month or so give them a foliar spray using maxicrop. Judge this by how the plants are looking not by a time table.

One of the main things that all growers need to learn is regular close observation. To know when they are healthy and need nothing to the first signs of deficiencies appearing. The one thing they may run short of is magnesium even if dolomite lime is used in the compost, this is easily dealt with by one watering plus a foliar spray, using 1 ounce of Epsom salts dissolved in a gallon of water.

They will need root pruning once or twice a year. This depends on how intensively they are fed and how good your water quality is. Despite what is normally quoted it is virtually impossible to flush out salt build up from a root ball. A temporary over fertilisation yes but the gradual crystallisation of salts and carbonate deposits no! If your water supply is heavily contaminated with minerals I recommend a small Reverse-Osmosis filter to clean your water for both your Mums and your production plants.

[Mr_Soul]

"Now root pruning and Mum renovation. "



The method of root pruning is the same for routine maintenance or renovation.

Here we are dealing with a 7 year-old mum that hasn't been root trimmed for nearly a year. I have deliberately neglected her for the last 10 weeks for purposes of showing you the recovery. She has been on a diet of R/O water only, no other feed of any sort. This is to show you how tough Cannabis is and how far you can let things slide and still get a mum back into productivity. Its not a recommended practice and continual abuse like this will eventually kill a mum.

Pic 1 - boy this lass is sick
Pic 2 - a hard prune back leaves her looking bare

[Mr_Soul]

As you can see there is little residual fertiliser left in the compost. It is what we call spent (worn out). The first thing we do is trim back nearly all the top growth back to the main framework branches. Leaving one or two tiny shoots at the tip of each branch to draw sap and keep the branch alive. If all the shoots and buds are removed, 99 times out of a 100 die back sets in-- and once that starts the whole plant usually dies within a month or two. It doesn't matter if the small shoots are yellow from lacking N, they will soon start to grow and green up as the new roots start forming!

Next the rootball should have 3/4 of an inch cut off each side and an inch off the bottom. This reduces the 4.5 x 4.5 x 4.5 inch rootball to 3 x 3 x 3.5 inches high after the loose compost is scraped from the top. This means that two-thirds of the soil is being replaced. A good full strength organic compost is used when repotting and it only takes a day or two for the roots to really start growing into the new compost.

[Mr_Soul]

Set the bottom of the rootball on about 3/4 of an inch of compost then pack out the sides and finally cover the top with a 1/4 to 3/8 of an inch. This means the mum is planted round a 1/4 inch deeper every time root pruning is done about 1/2 an inch a year. In a couple of years from now I will cut down vertically and split the plant in two as the side branch will have a root system of its own. Using this method the roots are constantly being replaced and as well the main trunk replaced slowly. This seems to keep the Mums healthy for many years.


The second mother of our selected "ES" line lasted for just over 15 years using this method. Interestingly if you want to hold a plant long term in a small pot say a 2.5 inch sq this can be root pruned the same as the 1 litre plant but only taking off about 1/4 of an inch all round. I keep Dads in this pot size and some are over 5 years old.


NOTE: it is very important to make sure there are no voids or air gaps left when packing the sides, use a pencil or small dibber, fill slowly and firm lightly.

The last picture is 12 days after the root and top pruning- It tells it's own story! Already there are enough nice leaders to make 10 good cuttings. I have to admit to putting her under an sodium light to speed up her development and make this Issues deadline. Even so, the recovery wouldn't have taken much longer in the mum box.

Thats it you should have all the info you need to make and root cuttings in compost the make and maintain bonsai mother plants, its easy, give it a go! .

pic 1 - trimming the rootball
pic 2 - after the job is done
pic 3 - back in the pot with fresh compost and ready to grow, all she needs is some light
pic 4 - 12 days later, not looking too shabby considering what I did to her

[eccofarmer]

NAMASTE

Backtothelab if you remember i posted that pick some time back after a year ago i entered a oline pic contest on bonsi.That is sweet tooth for all those who wanted to know.Was the first time i did it and have yet do another.It was for a friend out west who loves to bonsi all she sees.Glad to see it back up.Lost the pics of it in my files so was happy to get a copy of it back.I just started one with maple leaf indica this week to see how that one goes.Thought you would have remembered me posting it.Ether way nice to see it here again.

[meangreen]

Seems somebody's mouth got the best of em!

[bedlam]

cute little plant, l want one

[Flav_cool]

Coooool, I just read the whole thing. I never knew you could bonsi anything. It's like growing, but you're always reducing it back to shortness, it develops sideways but not up, and thats why it looks like a tree right?

[LuMpYtRiChOmEy]

--Mr Soul!!!! :) ! --Thats a TRULY INCREDIBLE volume of study youv posted!!!! --FUKIN BEAUTIFULL!!!! -and Greatly appreciated! -Its shurly gonna increase the efficiancy of MY mother aeria! -I JUST cut a new mom off my old mom and I was gonna take my last cuttings off my old mom next saturday and I was gonna live off of cuttings from 2 auxillary moms until my new mom grew and I was just gonna throw the old mom away. -This thread must have poped up for a reason RITE?!?! :) -Im gonna try this "Bonsi" shit instead!:) -Thanks again! >LT>**^^~~

[tiedye0420]

Im currently using multiple mothers, and they are all under a foot, and in 6" containers. Im getting more clones than i need to use this way, and it provides a good amount of variety.

If there is one thing i love more than ganja itself ,It is variety.
Variety is the spice of life.
None of my hybrids came from nevills genepool. NONE.

[tiedye0420]

here's some pics of my veg area.Mostly moms, and a tray of cuttings.
The white stuff everywhere is from releasing predator mites yesterday. It is the carrier. The one in the red bucket is a thai plant that is about 6 months old. Hows that for banzai. It is probly about 6 inches tall- actually it has been hit woth bat guano recently because im about to take clones from it. It is starting to grow rapidly- it was way smaller.L.O.L.

[eccofarmer]

NAMASTE


Tie Dye whats the white stuff all over your plants????
Theres like these white dots all over your plants.Did you spill something on them?????

[Spiral Sea]

thanks for all the info....had never heard of root-trimming before but it makes perfect sense to rejuvenate the roots as well as the parts above the ground.

[tiedye0420]

NAMASTE


Tie Dye whats the white stuff all over your plants????
Theres like these white dots all over your plants.Did you spill something on them?????Yes i did sprinkle the white stuff on them.It is sawdust or whatever they use at the bug factory to carry predator mites. That white stuff you could say is carnage from the battle.

[eccofarmer]

NAMASTE

Hey tie thanks just was wandering what that was.

[thrawn]

I thought you had a SERIOUS case of whiteflys or something. Got me worried! I wonder what in the sawdust keeps mites away, because isnt it just small bits of wood?

[tiedye0420]

the sawdust or whatever it is, is just cut. When you buy predators they come in a bottle of it. But it also helps you see where you covered and where you need more.

[Bonzi Nanna]

Hi all,

I'm very new to this and can use all the help I can get.
This is where I am at.
Seeds are soaking and starting to sprout. I feel great all ten seeds are sprouting. I purchased them over a year ago.

I am planning on having bozi mothers for my clones that I will be growing in SWG
system.

I need to grow them just enough to sex them before I start turning them into Bonzi.

Really need imput on the best way to do this.

[LuMpYtRiChOmEy]

--Weeeeeeelllllllllllllllllllll Im finaly bonsai'in my mom. -I cleaned me some coco coir and ph'ed it threwout the night and Im about ready to start pullin her out of the pot and start cuttin root an all that shit! -Neat!