Shimpaku Juniper - Bonsai Society of Upstate New York

February 2013
B
Volume 42 Number 2
illboard
Newsletter of The Bonsai Society of Upstate New York
February Meeting:
Next Meeting:
Tuesday, February 26, 7:00 pm
with Harvey Carapella
Harvey Carapella:
Shimpaku Juniper
Shimpaku Juniper
our February meeting,
A tHarvey
Carapella will
Brighton Town Lodge at Buckland Park
1341 Westfall Road, Rochester, New York
near corner of Westfall and Clinton
present a program about
Shimpaku Juniper. He will be
discussing the various techniques
used to create a bonsai tree from
raw Shimpaku Juniper (Juniperus
chinesis) stock. This evergreen
tree is easy to grow and maintain,
and also perfect for beginner
Billboard is brought to you by:
PRESIDENT:
Harvey Carapella,
President@bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
CO-EDITORS:
Tom Friday & Irma Abu-Jumah
Billboard@bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
CONTRIBUTORS:
bonsai growers. The dark green thread foliage
is small and tight, making for great scale.
There will be a handout relating to this topic.
Once completed, the tree will be auctioned off
with the proceeds going to the society.
Shimpaku Juniper-Informal
Upright-Styled by Kenji Miyata
Mark down the date
and don’t miss
this informative meeting!
A Little About Harvey: Harvey Carapella is a
retired graphic designer and currently an
assistant professor at the Rochester Institute of
Technology. He is the current and a past
president of our society. For over thirty years
he has worked to apply his knowledge of
design to the art of bonsai, and has made
presentations to several bonsai clubs, and at
symposiums, and conferences. He has also
won the award for best deciduous tree at the
2nd U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition for his
Japanese Maple.
Shimpaku Juniper-Styled
by Peter Warren
Mark Arpag, William N. Valavanis
2013 PROGRAMS
Mar. 14-17 Garden Artisans
Expo-Society display
Mar. 26
Bill Valavanis:
Japanese Black Pine
& Workshop
Apr. 6-7
GardenFactory Flower
& Garden Showcase
Society display
Apr. 23
Suthin Sukosolvisit:
Shohin-Demo &
Workshop
May 18-19
40th BSUNY Exhibition
Jun. 10
David DeGroot: Bonsai
Design & Workshop
Jun. 25
Picnic/Auction/Sale
Jul. 23
Garden Tour At Jerry
Kral’s Conifer Garden
Aug. 27
Bring Your Own Tree
Workshop
http://www.bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
2
February Bonsai Care Tips
an eye on your trees. We’ve had a fair amount of
K eep
temperature changes, check to see if anything might still
need water when the pots thaw.
Very hardy deciduous trees can be repotted toward the end of
the month if root tips show white. Continue to protect trees
from hard frost and don’t feed until spring. You may also dig up
raw material and pot into temporary containers. Even if you will
wait until March for potting, raw material roots can be undercut.
You may wire deciduous trees this month while buds are still
tight. As they swell, they become more fragile and are easily
damaged. Don’t wait too long, as you wouldn’t want to see this
year’s new growth lying in the pot after you finish hours of
wiring. Protect newly wired trees from frost until the buds
burst.
Late February is ideal for heavy branch pruning as long as the
remaining branches and shoots are healthy. Seal all wounds and
protect from frost until growth has begun. Toward the end of
the month, trim last year’s growth back to vigorous new shoots.
Do NOT over-water your newly potted trees. Keep pots moist
but not wet. As trees come out of dormancy, be aware that their
watering needs will increase. However, since it is still quite
cold, there is a chance that wet soil could freeze hard and
damage newly developing root fibers.
Be careful with any feeding. Strong fertilizers can easily
damage new roots. If your conifers did not get their bone meal
last fall, you may apply a light dose of fish emulsion, as this is
quite mild.
Keep an eye out for aphids and spider mites. They can defoliate
a conifer in a few weeks if unchecked. Commonly used
pesticides that are listed for your species should do the trick.
Remove algae from trunks and remove any Scale insects that
you find.
Tips acquired from Growing & Displaying Bonsai by Colin Lewis and Neil
Sutherland, and from Bonsai, the Art of Growing and Keeping Miniature Trees by
Peter Chan
Flower
& Garden
Showcase
Officer Election Reminder
Last Chance
At the March meeting we will be electing our
society officers. During the business meeting, the
candidates for the offices will be presented and voted
on. If anyone has any nominations give one of the
nominating committee a call and let them know.
Just make sure the person you are nominating knows
about it before you call.
Nominating Committee:
Joe Galley, Chair, 334-9472;
Rick Marriott, 247-3401
and Will Hebert, 413-0346
Garden Artisans Expo 2013!!
No GardenScape this year
Your HELP will be needed
for this show!
Garden Artisans Expo 2013
is a new show. Since the
Dome Center is closed it will
take place on March 14 to 17
at Southtown Plaza (in the old
MediaPlay store) in Henrietta. Our society will be
combining with the International Bonsai Arboretum to
have one display together. This is different from what
we have done in past years at GardenScape. Bill
Valavanis will be presenting programs on Classical
Bonsai Art, and on Stone Appreciation. He will not
have his sales booth at this show. We need members
to help answer questions and provide the public with
information on bonsai and our society. Please see Bob
Pfromm to schedule your time to help our society
inform the public about bonsai. NOTE: We will be
sending out more specifics as to display setup and
takedown when it becomes available. Come and get
a start on Spring.
We need your fine quality flowering bonsai for the
show. Please phone Bill Valavanis at 334-2595 to
offer your bonsai for the society display. Information
about the show can be found at: www.facebook.com/
GardenArtisansExpo
T
he Garden Factory will be having its Second Annual Flower & Garden Showcase on
April 6-7, 2013. BSUNY has been asked to participate and provide advice and answer
questions on the art of bonsai. The society will have a combined display of bonsai trees with
the International Bonsai Arboretum for people to look at.
It's going to be a bit different this year with no formal programs, but they would like to have
us demonstrate in our booth. The event is FREE and open to the public! We will need
member trees for the society display. If you have a tree or trees for our society display please
contact Bill Valavanis at 334-2595. Please see Bob Pfromm to schedule your time to help
during the show.
http://www.bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
January
Meeting
Highlights
3
O
ur January meeting featured a presentation by Sean Smith on The Art of
Suiseki. Suiseki (viewing stones) are used when displaying bonsai to present a
more complete picture of the natural physical world by including plants and animals
and landscapes etc. Sean first gave a slide show which gave the forty members
attending a history of the use of viewing stones, the terminology, and how the daiza
(wooden base) is carved to enhance the look of the stone. Sean is the number one
daiza carver outside of Japan and was the first American to exhibit an American
suiseki in the Japanese National Suiseki Show. After a short
break, Sean discribed and talked about the large display of
Suiseki and Paulownia (Kiri) wood boxes that they are stored
in that he brought with him. Sean also makes these beautiful,
very light, fine-grained, soft, warp-resistent boxes. Questions
followed. We were honored to have two visitors from the View
Stone Association of China (VSAC) with us at the meeting.
Sean kindly donated two items to the club for the raffle, a
thatched hut that was won by Joe Galley and Mark Arpag won
the Suiseki with Kiri wood storage box.
1
3
Sean drove up from his home and business in Marysville, PA
in the afternoon and also put on a workshop on Japanese
scroll making for ten of our members at the International
Bonsai Arboretum. See group photo below showing what was
accomplished in the three hour workshop. Bill Valavanis was
kind enough to allow us to use his studio for the workshop.
Thanks also go to Ron Maggio for hosting Sean while he was
with us.
Best wishes and a very Happy Birthday
to our society president, Harvey Carapella.
Many thanks Sean for your interesting
and informative presentation and workshop!
2
1. Members listening to Sean talk
about Suiseki.
2. Harvey cutting his birthday
cake. Best wishes!
3. Two large Suiseki on top of
their Kiri storage boxes.
4. Sean talking about the Suiseki
he brought with him.
4
5
5. Group photo from Sean’s
Scroll Making workshop. Nice
job!
Reminder about workshop after the MARCH meeting!
The workshop with Bill Valavanis is FREE but the participants must pay for the very fine
Japanese Black Pine tree. Materials cost for this workshop is $95 payable to the society. You
must bring your own wire and tools, no transplanting. People not participating in the workshop
are welcome to observe. There is a limited number of openings and trees available so register
and pay early to avoid disappointment. Sign up by contacting Ron Maggio at 872-0382 or email
him at treasurer@bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
http://www.bonsaisocietyofupstateny.org
4
History of the Shimpaku Juniper
J
uniperus chinensis 'Shimpaku' (the shimpaku juniper) is a dwarf, irregular vase-shaped
form of the Chinese juniper, Juniperus chinensis. It is a slow-growing evergreen
shrub. Foliage is attractive year-round.
Shimpaku is one of the more popular species for bonsai. It has attractive soft, bright
green foliage and beautiful red-brown bark make this one of the top candidates for
bonsai. Many wild trees have been collected in Japan, making it extremely rare to
find growing wild. In fact, today the Shimpaku junipers growing in the wild in Japan
face extinction due to over collecting. Shimpaku was and is very dangerous to
collect. Many of the best Shimpaku grow only in hard to get to cliff areas near the
sea. History tells us that the first Shimpaku to be collected in the wild came from the
Ishizuchi mountain range on Shikoku Island. Collected shimpakus are known for their deadwood, called jin and shari.
Many of the bonsai masterpieces are Shimpaku Junipers. Masahiko Kimura is known for having many outstanding
shimpaku.
Background: The Japanese may have been keeping some forms of Chinese Juniper for bonsai since the 1600’s,
Juniperus Chinensis “Sargenti” was first identified by botanist Charles Sprague Sargent on Hokkaido in 1892.
Sargent was the first director of the Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University, which houses a historically important
bonsai collection. At the time Sargent first identified this juniper to the Western World, the Japanese had already been
collecting specimens from the mountains for some thirty to forty years. As the Japanese middle class became
wealthier during the Meiji period, having a Shimpaku Juniper bonsai became a powerful status symbol, and collecting
specimen junipers from the mountains became an activity not only for professional bonsai collectors, but also for
mountaineers and miners looking for a profitable sideline, and speculators looking to bring in some quick money. The
golden age of Shimpaku collecting began about 1900, and ended in the 1950’s. These Junipers can take hundreds of
years to grow into a shape that produces a pleasing bonsai, and to produce the deadwood jins and sharis that make up
a world class bonsai today. Conservationists in Japan are now planting young junipers to take the place of those that
were removed by the collectors.
Picture: Shimpaku Juniper by Suthin Sukosolvisit, Photograph by Joe Noga.
Bonsai Society of Upstate New York
P.O. Box 92215
Rochester, New York 14692