Ulmus parvifolia update

Some progress on the little Ulmus parvifolia.  It's looking pretty treeish:

spike

Juniper, from auctioned nursery stock.  Just needs to puff out a bit.  A weaponized bonsai. 

Slim pair (Liquidambar)

A slim twin trunk Liquidambar from two saplings.  The branches still have a long way to go...

Liquidambar cave

This began as a 20 foot tree dug from the landscape.  All of the above ground parts have been removed, and the current interesting trunk was part of the root structure below ground.  The trunk and branches are all formed from suckers off of the root mass.  At some point, i split the tree in two.  The other half is coming along as well, and some time i may plant the two together as a small grouping.  The sides of the resulting hollow sealed over, forming an intriguing cave from the main front view.The branching is coming along, although it is still too coarse and simple.  Getting Liquidambar to be anything but coarse is a bit of a challenge.  It is19 inches high, currently.

rear view...

other half

shohin ulmus parvifolia

This one started this as a matchstick-thin cutting maybe ten years ago.  I have rebuilt it many times as I learned more.  It's one of the few of my early bonsai still around.  Now it almost looks right.  The pot is still too big, but i didn't want to risk reducing the roots even further.  It works pretty well in the round.

It begins...

Well, actually it began more than a decade ago.  I have been poking at bonsai since i was a teenager.  Finally some of it is coming along.

Hopefully the stories of my errors and discoveries living with bonsai will be of some use to others.  This will mostly consist of photo essays documenting the history of particular trees in my collection, with a smattering of thoughts on the art and science behind it all.