I love hiking, and I love being out in the wild; the time that I manage to spend putting one foot in front of another is almost as good as the time I spend wiring my trees

Over the fourth of July I went hiking in the Sonora Pass area. My main goal when I am hiking is to find trees that will inspire my bonsai designs. These can be anything from the blue oaks that I saw on the drive up there to those gnarled windswept bushes that are white pines at tree line. The snow, wind and short growing season do some great things to trees in the high country and I plan to continue using these trees as inspiration.

If you are not using nature as your inspiration you are missing out on the best source of visual information that is available. Bonsai started with the collection of wild trees from the mountains of China; even untrained these were inspiring and interesting specimens. Full size or dwarfed, trees growing in nature can really give you ideas for everything you do to your bonsai. From overall shape, to branch distribution, branch angle, and interesting formations that you could never think up, wild trees will spark your imagination with their wonderful forms.

I have a small, old juniper that I had been wondering what to do with. It seems like it would make a good wind influenced tree, but the trunk doesn’t quite make sense. I found a fantastic idea for a way to use it in this tree that wrapped itself around a rock. It started life on the windward side and after growing up decided to grow over the rock and then back down behind it to shelter itself from the wind. It almost looks like the tree melted over the rock. On my way back down from this hike I stopped in the river and collected a few small pieces of granite which might work with my tree.

This particular tree, although it didn’t have a crown of note, had some exceptional jin, ones which I plan to try to duplicate in my trees in the future. Notice the way that the live part of the tree is growing around the base of the jin. This is something that we can hope to accomplish if we train our trees with jin when they are still stock, then grow them out wildly again and then refine them. The wild growth will swell the trunk quickly and cause the lifelines of the juniper (or possibly some other species) to make the trunk look almost muscular.

I’ve had people ask me “how many jin or shari should I have on a tree;” my answer has always been: as many as you want to accomplish the design that you intend. High mountain trees have hundreds of dead branches, lowland trees might have none if they’re young, or a few rotting ones if they are older. It is design questions like this which you can solve for yourself if you take the time to study the various ways in which trees manage to grow. This pine, found atop a ridge around 10,000 feet has a dead top and many dead branches. The live branches are quite short, which makes the tree look slender. To acomplish this in a bonsai the branches have to be tiny, even on a tree that is 2 feet tall.
This Mountain Hemlock, one of the most beautiful species of trees that I have ever encountered, is small but already has a lot of character. The trunk has an S shape to it and the branches dangle gracefully all around the trunk. The foliage of Mountain Hemlock is much like true Fir, but it is finer and more graceful looking.
Check out the gallery for a few more trees to inspire you and if you are interested in going hiking or backpacking this summer, let me know.

Tags: Hiking, inspiration, jin, Shari, Wilderness