Sticks and Stuff

[Bugbear]

* Pictures removed *

I have a few more pictures from this last batch, so I'll get them out here.

***

These are branches I cut from my lemon tree earlier this year to be carved into walking staffs. I sealed the ends and cuts with wax, which I also spilt all over my studio floor, and I'll let them dry down for a year or more. I left the bark on them.

***

These are a couple of walking sticks that I am working on. The branch stick is saved from one of the almond trees that I removed from my property; the rest of the wood went to artists. I haven't decided what to carve into the knob on the end.

The other stick is an ash handle for a garden tool that I found in the back of the property about eight years ago. I like the long cracking in the wood, and it sands up fairly smoothly. I will need to fit it with a knob or handle of some sort. All of them will be for use around the place out here. I guess I'm not going to move, so they'll be gardening sticks.

***
These are a couple of the bonsai containers I have made. They are unglazed ceramic. I'm saving them for my own trees when they are ready to be potted.

[SFCRick]

looks like you have a good start for the walking sticks, and I will like to see your bonsai
trees once they are potted. I have a lovely older Japanese next door neighbor and she has a fantastic Japanese garden with hundreds of bonsai.

[JolyStNicholas]

Please post your results once you pot your trees.

5 years ago I planted Drake Elms around the edge of my property, most
grew tall over the years and have followed as nature intended, one have
sorta stopped at knee height and stayed there. It looks like a full grown Drake Elm, follows the leaveing patterns just like the big boys, but remains
a "small fry" a local nursery wants to trim and make it into a Bonzi, but I think I will just allow it to grow as it is. I do trim it round and control the
stragglers out the top.
The leaf's are so tiny, but fully formed. It is one of my favorites.

[thescot]

Thanks, Ted. It looks like some really good possibilities for the sticks. Being a big fan of walking sticks, I am always interested in who makes them, how they're made, the style, etc.

Ditto on the pix.

[The Barry]

You have a great start going on those sticks. What are your plans for finishing them?

[Bugbear]

Thanks, all.

On the bonsai trees, the summer heat out here makes it very difficult to grow bonsai; it can be a full time job. I have several that are still in the ground, and several that are still branches on trees waiting to be air layered off.

Elms make exelent bonsai, and there are natural dwarfed trees from growing conditions, and from mutations in many different species of trees and shrubs. I have been focusing on citrus for bonsai, and exploring desert succulants like the elephant food plant. To get a plant in the desert to grow in a properly sized bonsai container, it almost needs to be a succulant, so we have to use larger or deeper pots than usual.

On the sticks, I will be thinking about how and what to carve into them as they dry down over the next year or so. It is lemon wood, so is not the hardest or best wood for a staff. I hope to finnish the two shorter walking sticks some time this year.

[Bugbear]

I looked over my trees a while ago, and none are ready to go in a bonsai container. It can take a very long time, five to seven years, to get them somewhat like a bonsai tree. Basically the first several years are spent growing a trunk of the tree that is very fat at the base or root flare, and that, in most cases, has a substantial taper . The placement of the first few branches is also a factor in the first few years. How this is done depends on the species of tree, but often involves chopping the whole tree back to a stump or low branch one or more times a year etc.

The tree has to have a good root system to generate that much growth, so they are usually either grown in the ground or as a branch of a full grown tree, possibly in a very large container. The bonsai, when in it's proper container, almost stops growing, so is very easy to kill. Which I have done to many of my trees.