Now we have a good season when we can see a lot of very beautiful satsuki flowers. At the same time, we are very busy because we have a lot of things to do. Since it was very warm in Ise city in March and April and hot in May, every plant in my garden began to have the flowers much earlier than usual. They were daffodil, Japanese quince and andromeda, calanthe discolor, camelia, ume, cherry, Japanese tsutsuji (Okinawa, Yakusima, Kerama and mountain tsutsuji), peony, tree peony, rose and satsuki. But the large wisteria in the large bonsai pot didn’t have any flowers.
And the very strong sunlight gave the serious damages to a lot of satsuki flowers, especially the maximum temperature was over 35 degrees C in Ise city on 17th May. Since I didn’t prepare the black nets over the shelves yet, a lot of flowers were burnt by the sunlight. But it was cool from the evening to the morning. Therefore, it took a lot of satsuki trees a longer time to be in full bloom, so that a considerable number of satsuki trees didn’t look beautiful because a considerable number of flowers had fallen already when they were in full bloom. At last, I prepared the black nets in the afternoon of 22nd but it rained at night. And we have had the average temperature since then.
Repotting of satsuki trees
March is the best time to repot the satsuki trees in the pots except for cold climates. But washing the roots is the very hard working in the first half of the month because the water was still cold. I have to wear the waterproof jacket and trousers lest I should be wet. And sometimes the soil in the pots is frozen after repotting. But since I sold a lot of large good satsuki bonsai in the large bonsai pots, I didn’t have to repot any large trees in March. I had been able to repot only the small size of 8 trees which I introduced in the previous web site.
I always repotted the young satsuki trees in June because I couldn’t have any time to do so in March. But recently I do so in March and April, too. Since I don’t wash the roots of very young trees, I can repot a lot of them easily.
Section 1. Repotting of satsuki trees in April
Since I had been very busy with website updates and other jobs, I couldn’t repot the small and middle sizes of 9 satsuki trees by the end of Match. Though I had lacked the energy and strength to repot several satsuki trees for a while, I could repot 6 of them on 7th, 8th and 9th April. But unfortunately, I had to give up repotting of 3 small bonsai because I feared that they would die.
It was the great errors that I had made them drain the water. Though I had watered them sometimes since the middle of March when I had put them under the eaves to repot them, it was late that I knew that the lustre of the leaves was losing. Fortunately, since they had a lot of new sprouts, I was lucky. And I didn’t give them any fertilisers.
Part 1. Togenkyo
When I was given this tree by the owner of Takahashi engei (garden shop) in 2001, I cut the trunk short to make it have a good taper. Though I had decided to repot it within March, I couldn’t do so. When I took it out from the pot on 8th April, since the soil of root ball was soft, I decided not to remove all soil and wash the roots. I cut one third of root ball and remove the black soil on it and cleaned the bottom of the trunk with a bamboo stick. After washing the root ball, I planted it in the same bonsai pot. And I decided to make it have one fifth of flower buds because I would like to see how many formal flowers it will have. Immediately after I got it, it didn’t have any formal flowers but it increased the number of formal flowers year by year.
The left photo is the whole figure before repotting. The taper of the trunk and style are good. But the trunk hasn’t grown thick since 2001. The nebari is good on the middle photo. You can understand that the soil after washing the root ball isn’t hard on the right photo. Since I washed the trunk, the whole style looks good.
Whole figure after repotting is good on the left photo though some branches haven’t completed. The middle one is the top of this tree after removing three fourths of the flower buds. You may think that the number of them is more than you think, judging from the root ball. The right one is the right first branch. Though it didn’t have a lot of them, I removed three of fourths of them. Recently some varieties of satsuki don’t have a lot of flower buds. But I don’t know why. It is a fact that a lot of satsuki trees in the garden haven’t had a lot of them since about 10 years ago. It may be because it is very hot in summer (more than 35 degrees C). Though the satsuki bonsai on the shelves have the black nets over them in summer, I cannot understand any defects.
Part 2. Hikari-no-tsukasa
I have grown this tree since I took a lot of cuttings to sell a lot of satsuki trees at Ise satsuki society immediately after we moved from Kobe city to Ise city. Therefore, it may be 43 years old but the trunk isn’t thick. And since it has been planted in the pot for a long time, it is weak now. It may die in 5 years. But I decided to repot it. Though I didn’t do so in March, when I took it out from the pot on 8th April, since the soil of the root ball isn’t hard, I decided not to wash the roots after removing the soil completely.
The left photo is the whole figure of Hikari-no-tsukasa. You can see some dead flower buds and branches on the upper part of this tree. And you cannot see a lot of black soil on the surface of root ball after I removed the dirty soil on the middle photo. It means that this tree was so weak that it couldn’t have a lot of strong roots. But the nebari is very good. The right photo is the whole figure after I washed the root ball.
When this tree was very strong, since the nebari was very good, too, it had a lot of strong roots. Though it is weak now, you cannot see any dead roots on the left photo. Therefore, I decided to make it have one fourth of flower buds. The middle one is the whole figure after repotting. Though the style isn’t bad, it is poor as a bonsai. But it has a lot of strong flower bus after I removed one fourth of them on the right one.
Part 3. Biko
I have grown this Biko from the cutting since 1973 when I took a lot of cuttings but the trunk hasn’t grown thick. It has been weak for a long time but it continues to live and have flowers. But I removed all flower buds though I didn’t wash the roots after removing the soil. It is because the soil wasn’t hard when I took it out from the pot.
The left photo is the whole figure of this Biko. Since it doesn’t have a lot of new long shoots on each branch, we can understand that it is weak. After I removed the dirty soil on the root ball and cleaned the bottom of the trunk with a bamboo stick, the nebari is very good on the middle photo. After washing the root ball, I planted it in the same bonsai pot. Though the style isn’t bad on the right photo, each thick branch doesn’t have a lot of small branches.
Part 4. Eikan A and B
I have grown these trees of Eikan A and B from the cuttings. They are two of the satsuki trees which I made to sell them at the flower show of Ise satsuki society, that is, I couldn’t sell them. And Eikan B has only red flowers. I keep it as my error of making saplings of satsuki. Perhaps they are 25 years old but their trunks aren’t thick. Since I was studying very hard to publish a book at that time and resigned the chair man of the society at the age of 59, I couldn’t take good care of young trees.
The left photo is the whole figure of Eikan A before repotting. The style is very good. The middle one is the root ball after I cut out one third of it to wash the roots after removing all soil. The right one is it after I cleaned the bottom of the trunk with a bamboo stick.
I washed it after removing all soil. The nebari isn’t very good on the left photo. The middle one is the whole figure after repotting. The style and taper of the trunk are good. I didn’t prune it drastically because it had already a lot of sprouts on the right one.
The left photo is the whole figure of Eikan B before repotting. When I took it out from the pot, the soil wasn’t hard on the middle one. And I decided to make it have one fourth of flower buds because it had a lot of long shoots. I cleaned the bottom of the trunk and the root ball with a bamboo stick on the right one.
The left photo is the root ball after I washed it. The nebari isn’t very good. The middle one is the whole figure after repotting. Since I trimmed it after removing long shoots, the style isn’t bad. Since I made it have one fourth of flower buds, you can see a considerable number of them on the right one.
Part 5. Asuka
Though this Asuka was made to sell at the flower show of Ise satsuki society, too, I couldn’t do so. It isn’t good as a material of satsuki bonsai, but I keep it because it has good flowers every year. The left photo is the whole figure after I took it out from the round terracotta pot. I don’t like the bottom of the trunk. Since the soil isn’t hard, I decided not to wash the roots. And I cut out one third of the root ball to plant it in a larger rectangle bonsai pot.
Without the defect of the bottom of the trunk, the style seems good on the middle photo. After repotting it, I decided to make it have one fifth of flower buds and trimmed it. Though it has a considerable number of flower buds on the right photo, since I gave the damage of repotting to it, I am afraid whether it will have a lot of good flowers or not because it has the large size of flowers.
Part 6. Nikko A and B and Kozan
Since I made these three trees drain the water after I had put them under the eaves lest they should have a lot of rain to repot them in the middle of March. Though I had watered them sometimes, I knew that they were losing the lustre of leaves a little bit on the day when I lifted one of them to repot them. Though I gave them a lot of water instantly, at once I gave up repotting them. But since they didn’t have any new sprouts, I thought that they didn’t have any strong damages but I was afraid that they might fall all flower buds or die. I was happy to see each of them have only some dead flower buds. And they had a lot flowers though some of them weren’t good.
When I took photos of Nikko A on 22nd April, though several brown leaves were seen on the left photo, since this tree wasn’t weak, I was very happy. And I gave the perfect organic fertilisers to it. But you can see a few dead flower buds on the top of the main trunk on the middle photo. Since it was very warm in April and May, especially the maximum temperature was 35 degrees C on 17th May when it was in full bloom on the right photo. Though it hasn’t a lot of the red-striped flowers, the colour arrangement of flowers is very good.
Though several brown flower buds were seen on the left photo, I was happy to know that this tree of Nikko B wasn’t weak, either. Since it didn’t have any dead flower buds on the middle photo, I gave the perfect organic fertilisers to it. When I photographed it on 17th May, it was in full bloom on the right photo. Since it doesn’t have any red-striped and red flowers, the colour arrangements of flowers isn’t good.
This Kozan had the strongest damages of the three trees. Therefore, it has several dead flower buds and a lot of brown leaves. The left photo is the front side of this tree, the middle one is the back side and the right one is the top. Especially it had a strong damage on the top.
I was much surprised to see two red-striped flowers when I photographed this Kozan on 17th May though it wasn’t in full bloom. Since I haven’t seen any red-striped flowers for about 20 years, I was confident that Kozan is the parent of Niko, that is, Nikko is a bud sport of Kozan. You can see a narrow red-striped flower on the left photo and a wide red-striped flower on the middle. The right one is the whole figure of this tree which was in full bloom on 20th May. Since the trunk girth is very thick though the height is low and the taper of the trunk is very good, I would like to keep it as long as I can take care of it.
Section 2. Cherry blossoms
Like I introduced Kawazu cherry trees which have flowers in February on the previous web site, I was satisfied with those beautiful flowers very much. And I decided to go to Takami-no-sato to see the weeping cherry blossoms in April. Therefore, I didn’t go to any famous places where we can see a lot of cherry blossoms of Someiyoshino in Ise city. I could enjoy the flowers of Issai cherry trees in the pots on the shelves and the cherry blossoms in a lot of places near my house and see them on a lot of distant mountains as clumps of white colour.
Part 1. Weeping cherry blossoms
I introduced several photos of the weeping cherry blossoms on the web site whose date was 5th May 2016. When I and my wife went to Takami-no-sato to see them for the first time on 27th April 2014, though a lot of the weeping cherry trees were young, their blossoms were very splendid and we were in a blizzard of cherry blossoms when strong winds blew. We went there 4 times since then but we couldn’t do so for three years because the park was closed to prevent the coronavirus infection. When we and a friend of mine went there by my car on 11th April, I was surprised to see the very gorgeous flowers of a lot of very large weeping cherry trees whose weeping branches touched our heads. Since it was so early in the morning that a lot of visitors didn’t come there yet, I was much satisfied with the good atmosphere and felt as if we were in the Togenkyo (paradise) when we were sitting down on the bench for a while. And we could enjoy the flowers of a small number of Rhododendron.
Takami-no-sato is located on the high mountains between Nara and Mie prefectures and it is so much cooler there than in Ise city that these cherry trees always begin to have flowers late. Generally speaking, weeping cherry trees begin to flower much later than Someiyoshino which is the most popular cherry tree. But the weeping cherry trees in Takamin-no-sato began to flower very early in 2023 because it was very warm in March and the first 10 days of April. It is said that there are more than 1,000 weeping cherry trees in the park, including a small number of mountain cherry trees. Since more than a half of them are planted on the steep slopes, I think it is very dangerous to cut the weeds and plants under them and take care of them.
Part 2. Issai zakura
Issai zakura means all varieties of cherry trees which are planted in bonsai pots. Therefore, their flowers are smaller than those of Someiyoshino and they don’t grow large. My wife gave me 3 trees of Issai zakura about 40 years ago that she had bought when she went to Hokkaido and Kanto districts with high school boys and girls on the school trips.
Now I have 3 old trees and 3 young trees. Since the former had been planted in the pots for a long time, halves of their trunks and some branches died but they continue to have flowers. The latter is a kind of offshoot of a parent tree. When I repotted the former about 10 years ago, I separated the offshoots from the parent trees and planted them in terracotta pots. If we would like to get a lot of the saplings, we can get them by inserting the cuttings into Kanuma soil.
Since it was late for me to photograph these trees, you cannot see a lot of flowers of them on the following photos. I always take photos of them as the records of the young trees in the process of growth in my computer. Especially I would like to keep the records of styling of young trees. But this is my excuse and I had to take photos of them which were in full bloom.
The left photo is the oldest tree. Perhaps it is more than 40 years old. Since it has been planted in a pot for a long time, it has some dead branches every year. The tree on the middle photo shows us an miserable figure. Since the upper part of the trunk died, I cut it several years ago. Therefore, this tree on the right photo is only a simple tree which has been planted in the pot.
Perhaps these trees are more than 10 years old. But I haven’t made them have good styles yet. Since I would like to make them small bonsai which have thick trunks, I haven’t pruned it drastically. Since they have little leaves, the growth is slow.
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