The practice of bonsai gardening is a timeless art form of literally miniaturizing trees. The practice itself is well over 2000 years old, and started during China’s Han dynasty. The Chinese word for bonsai gardening, pen’jing, literally means “tray scenery” or “tree or shrub planted in a shallow tray”. It was named bonsai by the Japanese, who adopted the practice around the ninth century.
Bonsai gardening is definitely one of the most unique and beautiful forms of art in the area of gardening. Since its early beginning in ancient China to the present day, it has developed into many attractive individual styles. Once miniaturized, however, maintaining the look and well-being of the bonsai requires an amount of care and attention by the gardener.
There are several styles that are common to the art form of bonsai gardening. These styles include:
- formal upright
- cascade
- forest
- slant
- literati
- root-over-rock
Bonsai grown in the more formal upright style have upright trunks which are straight and tapering. Cascade style bonsai are intentionally groomed to resemble trees that grow on the sides of mountains. Forest style bonsai are reasonably self explanatory. They are comprised of several trees planted together in odd numbers. This style of bonsai gardening is intended to copy the diversity of age and height which is natural in the wild.
Slant style bonsai are appropriately named. Their trunks are straight, like those of the formal upright style, but lean at a slant from the surface of the soil. Literati bonsai were inspired by ancient brush paintings of trees that grew in inhospitable climates. Therefore they don't have many branches. What branches they do have are usually concentrated at the top of the trunk, which is generally contorted. In the root-over-rock style, the roots of the bonsai are wrapped around a rock at the base of the tree.
An important part of bonsai gardening is knowing how to care for your bonsai. Bonsai require a warm location with plenty of light in order to thrive. Avoid placing them near window sills, due to the varying temperatures that can occur from drafts.
Watering is not done as you would typically water a standard houseplant. Bonsai trees require immersion of the entire pot or tray in water for several minutes. Once taken out of the water, allow the bonsai to drain. During the summer, bonsai should be watered daily, and every second day during the cooler months.
Bonsai also require a lot of fertilizer. Fertilizer should be given to the bonsai only after watering. A typical feeding schedule would be once every two weeks during the summer months, reducing that to once a month for the rest of year.
Bonsai are living trees, and so grow and sprout new branches and limbs as time passes. When the time comes to prune this new growth, stay true to the original theme of your bonsai. Remember, you just want to preserve the look of your bonsai, so don’t prune too much – only enough to remove the new sprouts and shoots.
When you're just starting out, there's a lot to learn. So it's a good idea to have some bonsai information on hand, such as Bonsai Gardening Secrets. If you want to create and own beautiful Bonsai Trees, then this quick and easy step by step guide to creating your very own Bonsai Trees is invaluable.
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