We had a sad news. IOC decided that all foreign people should not be allowed to see any Olympic games in Tokyo 2020. Only all athletes will try to get a championship with Japanese people. Now the number of the people who were infected with coronavirus is increasing in the world again though a lot of people had the vaccination. I may be able to have it in the end of April. How many Japanese people will be allowed to see them?
Satsuki kenkyu (a monthly magazine) reported us in about 2005 that a lot of satsuki trees began to die of the severe heat everywhere in the midsummer. Since the maximum temperature was not so hot in Ise that I continued to keep them under the ordinary condition. But since a few trees died in 2008, my brother and his wife helped me to build a shading structure with iron pipes and black nets in September 2009, which he continues to build over the green tea trees for about 2 weeks before cutting the very young shoots so that they may reduce the sunshine by 75 %. I thought that it was the best for the health of my satsuki bonsai that I closed them at 8:00 and opened at 16:00 in summer, and did so at 10:00 and at 14:00 in middle of September, and stopped doing so at the end of the month. Of course, in the morning I had to water all of my satsuki and other trees on the shelves. But though I had to water small trees and young trees in the evening, I did nothing but wetted leaves, trunks and branches of big trees with water in the evening, and sometimes at night again. This structure didn't save me any labour but the fee of water.
But a lot of satsuki trees in the pots died in 2016 and 2017. Especially three fifths of them were the trees which I had dug out from the nursery in 2009. Since I repotted them in March or April 2014, I think that this repotting may have caused their deaths. They may not have been healthy after I had dug them out from the nursery and planted them in very large terracotta pots after washing the roots and put them under the shadowing nets. And besides the maximum temperature was 35 degrees C in Ise. They had the very bad conditions.
At last, the maximum temperature in Ise was 38 degrees C last summer. Though I had endured the heat of 33 degrees C in the garden in my life , since I cannot endure the heat of 35 degrees C, I stayed in the room in the daytime where I had to switch on the air-conditioner to cool the room. And a few branches of some satsuki trees in the pots and nursery began to die in 2020 again. I think that I had a great problem. Do I have to think of other methods to make them live strong?
These photos are my shading structure. You can see the flowers of satsuki and rose on them which were taken in 2012, but since we sold a half of rose trees to make a water melon field last year, we cannot see them now. And though I sold a lot of satsuki bonsai on the shelves, we still a lot of satsuki flowers on them because I brought a considerable number of satsuki trees in the pots there from other selves.
The flowers of the satsuki trees which died
Since I introduced a lot of the flowers of the satsuki trees which I had sold in the previous web site, I would like to introduce a lot of the flowers of the satsuki trees which died. Though I began to take a considerable number of photos in 2007 by a digital still camera, I couldn’t take any photos of satsuki flowers till 2010 because I had been very busy in the blooming seasons of satsuki. It is a great pity that I cannot see any photos of the flowers of the satsuki trees which died before and after my retirement from Kogakkan university in 2007. I didn’t wither any good satsuki trees which I had bought as araki till about 2005. But two or three good trees which I had grown from the cuttings died every year because I had lent them to a friend of mine and the wife of the president of our university for a blooming season. Though I changed the trees once a week, since they didn’t give them a lot of water every day, they died in the autumn and in a year or two. Though I knew that they would die, I couldn’t refuse their asking. Therefore, now I don’t have any good large trees which I have grown from the cuttings.
Chapter 1. The flowers of satsuki trees in the bonsai pots, which I bought as araki
When the owners of satsuki garden began to sell satsuki trees as araki in Kanuma, though they were very expensive, since I got a lot of money every month as my pocket money except the salary of the university at that time, I could buy some expensive araki every year. And I haven’t bought any completed satsuki bonsai in my life. But since more than a half of trees which I had bought withered, I would like to introduce how beautiful their flowers were and how much money I lost by showing the photos and the prices of each trees. Since I think that growing satsuki trees and fishing have made me live till now, though I spent a lot of money for them, I have to thank them for keeping my life. When I left the hospital after staying for more than 5 months at the age of 30, even if I got the regular job, I could never hope that I would be able to retire at retirement age. Therefore, my web site shows an aspect of a story of my life.
Section 1. Kaho, Yama no hikari A and Sakurakagami
When I bought this Kaho for 100,000 yen in November 1989, the height was 72 cm and the trunk girth was 22 cm. I made a hole on the middle part of the trunk and pushed a long shoot through it to make a back branch in March 1991. And the tree had a good branch in 1993. Therefore, it has a good style on the left phot which I took in May 2012. When I repotted it in March 2014, the height was 75 cm, and the trunk girth was 38 cm. But it died in February 2016.
Since this tree continued to live in the pot for 26 years, I may have made it die. I thought two major causes: I made a hole with a drill in the trunk to make a branch, and when I repotted it in March, I removed only three fourths of flower buds to see the flowers. It is a fact that the tall trunk of the tree had been cut short when I bought it. But the death of the tree may have been caused by senility because it lived hard in the pot for a long time. The colour arrangement of the flowers and the style were so good that it was one of my favourites.
The flowers of Yama no hikari A were very beautiful and gorgeous on the middle photo which was taken in 2012. I bought this tree for 70,000 yen in 1992. The height was 71 cm and the trunk girth was 21 cm. Though I bought two trees (A and B) of this variety, since one of them (B) died in about 2002, I don’t have any photos of the tree. Since their very tall trunk had been cut short, the tapers of the trunks were not good and the scars were not covered with the new bark completely. But though they were cured in 5 years when I repotted them, I think the scars inside the trunks didn’t live. And since they had good styles and flowers, I put them on the table at our flower show and lent one of them (B) to a friend of mine. I think these were the main causes of their deaths.
I bought this Sakurakagami for 6,700 yen in Osaka in 1987. The height was 61 cm and the trunk girth was 13 cm. When I changed the front of this tree on the contrary in March 1991 and restyled the top drastically, I made a large scar there. Therefore, the style was very good. And the tree had a lot of very good flowers on the right photo which was taken on 3rd June 2012. When I repotted it in March 2015, the height was 58 cm and the trunk girth was 28 cm. And it continued to live in the pot for 30 years and died in 2017. I think it is because the large scar wasn’t cured completely yet and it had the severe heat in summer.
Section 2. Korin A, Nikko A and B
When I bought this Korin A for 60,000 yen in November 1991, the height was 48 cm and the trunk girth was 18 cm. Since the trunk wasn’t cut short, I planted it in the very large wooden pot to grow it as soon as possible in 1996. Since this tree had necessary branches and the taper of the trunk was good, I planted it in the large bonsai pot in 2007. Since it had the same size of flowers on the left photo which was taken on 5th June 2012, these flowers were beautiful though they had the same colour. When I repotted it in March 2013, the height was 56 and the trunk girth was 33 cm. And I cannot understand why it died suddenly in September 2015 because the roots and the nebari were very good. Therefore, the fatal damage may have been the severe heat.
I bought this Nikko A for 230,000 yen in October 1990. Since the height was 38 cm and the trunk girth was 25 cm, the price was very expensive. Since the colour-arrangement and the style are good, the whole blooming figure of the tree is very good on the middle photo which was taken on 2nd June 2012. When I repotted it in March 2013, since the height 45 cm and the trunk girth was 43, it was one of the very good completed satsuki bonsai.
But a small branch of this tree had begun to die suddenly in September 2016 and it died in 2017. I think it was because I put it on the table at our satsuki flower show. Though I had given a lot of water to every satsuki tree, since the air of the show room was cool and dry with air conditioning, all of my satsuki trees on the tables didn’t like this condition, Though I knew it, since I was the president of Ise satsuki society at that time, I thought that I had to put some good satsuki bonsai on the table at our satsuki flower show. But I never put the most expensive satsuki bonsai there.
I bought a young tree of this Nikko B for 3,500 yen in 1990 and planted it in the nursery. When I dug out this tree from there and planted it in the large bonsai pot in March 2014, I didn’t measure the height and trunk girth. It doesn’t have any red flowers on the right photo which was taken on 2nd June 2017. Therefore, this tree wasn’t a good satsuki bonsai even if the style had been good. Since I don’t have any other records about this tree, perhaps it died in 2018.
Section 3. Nikko C and Koka
When I bought this Niko C for 30,000 and planted it in a large terracotta pot in November 1992, the height was 57 cm and the trunk girth was 18 cm. I planted it in the nursery to grow it large as soon as possible in September 1995. When I dug out this tree from there and planted it in the large bonsai pot after washing the roots in March 2014, the height was 68 cm and the trunk girth was 39 cm. Though it doesn’t have a good colour-arrangement of flowers on the left photo which was taken on 30th May 2017, it has a red swelling flower bud on the front side of this tree and a red flower on the back side. But the style is not very good. And it died at the end of the year. Perhaps when I planted it in the bonsai pot, since I cut a lot of large roots, the severe heat in summer gave it the great damage though it had been put under the shadowing net.
When I bought this Koka for 100,000 yen in November 1994, I planted it in a large terracotta pot. The height was 49 cm and the trunk girth was 30 cm. Though the trunk was very thick, the price was cheap. When I planted it in the Kanton pot in March 2011, the height was 60 cm and the trunk girth was 44 cm. I liked this colour-arrangement of flowers on the middle photo which was taken on 2nd June 2012. But when I repotted it on 4th April 2017, since the trunk girth was 44 cm, I thought why it had the same trunk girth as it had had in 2011. And though I took the right photo on 14th May, the whole figure was good. But it died in 2018. Though I cannot understand why it died, withering may have depended on this Canton pot, that is, been due to over-humidity. Therefore, I haven’t used this pot since then.
Section 4. Kozan no hikari, Nyohozan A and Kozan
When I bought this Kozan no hikari for 70,000 yen in October 1990, the height was 56 cm and the trunk girth was 33 cm. And it shows you the whole figure of the beautiful flowers on the left photo which was taken on 7th June 2012. When I repotted it on 3rd April 2013, the height was 63 cm and the trunk girth was 36 cm. The trunk didn’t grow thick for 23 years. And it died in about 2016.
When I bought this Nyohozan for 700,000 yen in November 1997, the height 56 cm and the trunk girth was 33 cm. Since the style was good and the trunk was very thick at that time, it was very expensive. And the whole figure of the tree which had flowers is very good on the middle photo which was taken on 4th June 2012. When I repotted it on 3rd April 2013, since the height was 58 cm and the trunk girth was 46 cm, it looked like a very good bonsai. But it died in autumn 2016.
When I bought this Kozan for 400,000 yen on 11th November 1998, the height was 46 cm and the trunk girth was 46 cm. Though the trunk was very thick, the price was very cheap at that time. But it began to wither in spring 2010. And a half of branches died when I took the right photo in October. I don’t have any other records about this tree.
And though I had bought Nyohozan B for 500,000 yen in November 1992 whose height was 56 cm and whose trunk girth was 30 cm, Nikko D for 500,000 yen whose height was 47 cm and whose trunk girth was 37cm, Korin B for 350,000 yen in November 1993 whose height was 53 cm and whose trunk girth was 30 cm, Eikan for 550,000 yen in November 1995 whose height was 62 cm and whose trunk girth was 46 cm and Nyohozan C for 900,000 yen in November 1999 whose height was 50 cm and whose trunk girth was 41 cm, I don’t have any photos and other records about them because they died in some years after I had bought them. How much money I did lose! Was I stupid?
But though the trunks of these very expensive trees were very thick at that time and they had some very large scars on the trunks after the very thick branches had been cut, they didn’t have any good treatments of very large scars. And a lot of very expensive araki died in Japan. I thought and think that their deaths had been caused by them. Therefore, a lot of araki had good treatments of large scars in several years. And now a lot of good araki are sold and their prices are much cheaper (a half or one thirds).
Chapter 2. The flowers of satsuki trees in the terracotta pots, which I bought as araki
The reasons why I continued to keep these satsuki trees in very large terracotta pots after I had bought them was that I would like to complete them into bonsai as soon as possible and some of them had some problems. But all of them died.
Section 1. Hakurei, Kobai no kagayaki and Nikko E
When I bought this Hakurei 250,000 yen in October 1991, the height was 56 cm and the trunk girth was 26 cm. Though the trunk wasn’t very thick at that time, since the style was good, it was very expensive. I continued to plant it in a very large terracotta pot to make it into bonsai as soon as possible. Though I happened to find out the left photo which was taken on 30th May 2011, I cannot remember when it died. I don’t have a lot of records of growth and photos about a lot of trees which died because I erased them from my personal computer.
I bought this Kobai no kagayaki for 50,000 yen in November 1998 whose height was 64 cm and whose trunk girth was 33 cm. Since it did not have some necessary branches, I made three by grafting three long shoots to the trunk. When I repotted it on 6th April 2016, the height was 64 cm and the trunk girth was 33 cm. The trunk didn’t grow for 18 years. Therefore, judging from this fact, I thought it would die. When I bought it, the very long trunk already had been cut short. And this variety is weak. But I liked this colour-arrangement of flowers on the middle photo which was taken on 30th May 2011.
I bought this Nikko E for 5,000 yen in November 1992 whose height was 50cm and whose trunk girth was 11 cm and planted it in the nursery. And I dug it out from there and planted it in a very large terracotta pot in April 2008. The height was 53 cm and the trunk girth was 32 cm. We can see the smaller leaves on the left first branch on the right photo which I took on 5th June 2012. Therefore, I took a considerable number of cuttings to make a lot of saplings. But since I couldn’t see any red flowers on it, I hoped that some of them would have a red flower. Though I have grown 10 trees of them, they haven’t had any red flowers. One of them has all white flowers and the rest of them have only the red-striped flowers. Though I repotted this tree on 5th April 2016, since the height was 57 cm and the trunk girth was 35 cm, I thought that the trunk hadn’t grown thick for 8 years. And it died in 2017.
Section 2. Nikko F, G, H, I, J and K
I bought these young Nikko in about 1991 and planted them in the nursery. And I dug them out from there and planted them in very large terracotta pots after washing the roots in March 2009 when an English youth came to our house and stayed for a month to study how to grow satsuki trees. And he helped me to plant them there. But all of them died in about 2017. And I allowed him to remove the soils from three large trees which he had dug out from the nursery, prune them, wash the roots of them and plant them in large terracotta pots by himself. Though they were not good trees, all of them died within 4 years. Now I think this is my failure, but I tried to see the results of his workings about them. It was one of my experiences because I had a lot of satsuki trees in the nursery.
When I planted Nikko F in a very large terracotta pot in 2009, the height was 60 cm and the trunk girth was 33 cm. And when I repotted it in March 2014, the height was 65 cm and the trunk girth was 35 cm. When I planted Nikko G in a very large terracotta pot in 2009, the height was 57 cm and the trunk girth was 27 cm. And when I repotted it in March 2014, the height was 65 cm and the trunk girth was 30 cm. Other trees (Nikko H, I, J and K) had the same records as these trees had. When planting large satsuki trees after washing the roots, I always repot them every 5 years. But it was unnecessary for me to repot all of them in 2019 because they died. These photos were taken on 5th June 2012.
Chapter 3. The flowers of satsuki trees which I grew
I made several hundred saplings of satsuki about 47 years ago. Though I have less than 10 trees now, some of them have rotten parts in the trunks and some of them are weak. Even if we continued to have special cares toward them, I think it is impossible to have kept them in the pots from the cuttings for more than a half of century. Though a lot of satsuki trees which I had grown from the cuttings died, I couldn’t store any photos of them in my personal computer because I had taken them with film before 2010. Therefore, I would like to show you several photos of memorial trees, which I took them with a digital camera.
Section 1. Daisetsuzan, Meicho and Gekkeikan
Now Daisetsuzan is a rare variety. I grew this tree from the cutting which I had inserted into the Kanuma soil in 1972. This very tall tree has a lot of extremely large white flowers on the left photo which was taken on 8th June 2012. It was one of trees whose thick trunks I succeeded in bending into good styles with thick wires after we had moved from Kobe to Ise in 1978. Though it continued to have a lot of flowers, since this variety is weak, it died in about 2016.
Though these flowers of Meicho are very beautiful, it doesn’t have a good style on the middle photo which was taken on 30th May 2011. Two good trees of this variety already died by 2011 because I had lent one of them to a friend of mine and put other one on the table at our flower show. Generally speaking, a lot of varieties which have a lot of very large or extremely large flowers are weak because they don’t have a lot of fine roots. Therefore, we have to take good care of repotting them.
Gekkeikan is a weak variety. Though it has a lot of beautiful flowers on the right photo, the style isn’t very good because the trunk was so thick that I couldn’t bend it into a good style by thick wires when it was a young tree. But the flowers are beautiful on the right photo which was taken on 11th June 2012. A lot of Japanese satsuki enthusiasts don’t like this variety because it begins to bloom much later than other varieties.
Section 2. Benigasa, Shinnyo no tsuki and Murasakifuji
I haven’t made any good bonsai of Benigasa since I began to grow satsuki trees in 1972. This Benigasa doesn’t have a good style on the left photo which was taken on 30th May 2011. Though it died in about 2017, I have 7 young trees of this variety now. Since one of my friends asked me to give him a few trees, I made more than 10 saplings.
The whole figure of Shinnyo no tsuki is most beautiful when I took the middle photo on 4th June 2012. And the cascade of this tree was shorter and shorter whenever it fell down on the ground from the shelf by the very strong winds. Whenever the typhoon approached to us, I brought it into the garage. Though the trunk was very thick, it died in 2016 or 2017.
The cascade of Murasakifuji was shorter and shorter, too, whenever it fell down on the ground from the shelf by the very strong winds. Therefore, the whole figure on the right photo which was taken on 3rd June 2012 isn’t the style of cascade. Though the trunk was very thick, it died in 2016 or 2017.
Section 3. Nikko L and M and the unknown A
Nikko L and M have the multi-trunked styles on the left and middle photos which were taken on 3rd June 2012. The colour-arrangement of flowers of Nikko L isn’t good but that of Nikko M isn’t bad. The saplings of these trees were made in about 1994 after I had separated the shoots from the parent trees in the nursery because they had had roots in the Kanuma soil. But since the centres of the root balls are weak in the multi-trunked trees, I think they cannot live in the pots for more than 30 years without special cares. They died in 2016 or 2017.
The unknown A has a lot of beautiful flowers on the right photo which was taken on 3rd June 2012. This tree was one of some seedlings which I found on the ground in the nursery of satsuki trees in about 1996. Though I had grown it because it had had a good colour arrangement of flowers, since it was the multi-trunked tree, it died in 2016 or 2017.
Section 4. The unknown B and C and Osakazuki
The unknown B has a lot of beautiful flowers on the left photo which was taken on 3rd June 2012. This tree was one of some seedlings which I found on the ground in the nursery of satsuki trees in about 1996, too. I cannot know the parents of the unknown A and B because the colours and forms of their flowers are different from those of the trees in the nursery. It died in about 2017.
The unknown C was one of the trees in the garden of the old house which we bought in 1978. When I dug it out from there, it was small, short and very weak. I removed all dead branches and shoots and planted it in a small terracotta pot after washing roots. Therefore, I couldn’t judge the variety. When we see the whole figure of this tree on the middle photo which was taken on 3rd June 2012, the trunk is thick and the colour-arrangement of flowers is very good. Though I often tried to confirm the variety, I couldn’t do so. Though it continued to live in the pot for 37 years, since it had a large scar, it died in 2016.
This Osakazuki was one part of the tree which I had dug out from the bank of the lane by the tea field of my grandfather in 1972. Though it was a very small tree, the trunk is very thick and the style is good on the right photo which was taken on 28th May 2012. I still have a large part of the tree though it is weak. All of the rest died though they lived in the pots for a long time.
The archives
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