Pruning My Apple Bonsai
Hi everyone nigel saunders here it is a balmy 11 degrees celsius or 51 degrees fahrenheit out today and we’re beginning the big meltdown the ice is melted off the top of the rain barrel so i can get fresh rain water for my plant room and for my outdoor trees i just fill pails up with water like this and i carry it into the plant room and fill the big barrel up in there so i’ve got it about a third full right now so i think today i’ll probably get it up to about half full and it’s supposed to rain tomorrow so that’s good i can fill it right up and that’ll do me right until summer or when the plants go out of the plant room you know probably april this water is just snow melting off the roof so it is rain water it just comes from snow this big ice chunk will probably melt it’s like an iceberg you know one tenth of it or is it one-tenth or 120th is above the water and most of it is below so hopefully in the next few days it’ll thaw and melt yesterday i worked on my fuji occidentalis my cathedral style and i wasn’t very happy with the video it was really hard to see the tree because of all the bright snow made the tree look really dark so i’m going to clean off my studio area so we can get a nice black background and show the trees off really well i’ll show this tree spinning around with the black background so you can see what it looks like at this present time i’ve got a lot of ice and snow on this bench so i’ll have to clear it all off move my trees to another bench keeping them safe from the rabbits and then i can film in this area once again all right let’s see if i can get the trees out of here there’s a large yeah a little frozen but these are jonathan’s root maker pots i gotta return these to them oh don’t fall off of there so it’s not easy clearing the bench off there’s a lot of snow and ice stuck to the top of the bench and there’s a lot of pots that are just frozen in there i’ll do what i can hopefully by the end of today everything will be melted and i can get that cleared off properly so some of these larches i planted in the community gardens that came off and the last two pots here now there we go i think i’ll get the shovel and try and clean all this snow and ice off of here maybe i can do with my hands i better get the shovel big chunks ice all right let’s see what the shovel can do that’s pretty good there we go just like summer now yeah that’ll do that’s pretty good now that i’ve got my outdoor bench all cleared off we can start today’s video hi everyone nigel saunders here today i’ll be working on my apple bonsai in previous videos a lot of my apple tree had died off with disease or something and i’ve been trying to restore its shape so i’ve been growing this live vein i grew it really tall and then i cut it off here last year and then i’ve allowed the new branches to grow really tall and today we’ll be cutting it back once again let’s have a look and see how tall i let the leader grow so this is the living vein of the tree it came up here and i pruned it here last year and then it sprouted one two three branches in that area and there’s one main dominant branch here and it grew up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up so yeah it’s pretty tall i’ll give you an overall view of it so lots of vigor in that branch so again i’ll prune it back and we’ll see what happens i usually don’t overwinter my hearty trees in clay pots but this pot is a tokonami pot from japan a really high quality pot i got it from usher from the guelph bonsai society he didn’t have a tree big enough to suit this pot and i’m not even sure if this apple tree is big enough to suit this pot but that’s what i’m growing it in and it’s a really good high quality pot and it has no problem going through the winter it doesn’t crack or anything it’s uh in good shape uh usher from the golf club has passed away so it’s great to have something to remember him by he was a really nice guy i’m going to prune this leader now so i’m looking for leaf buds there’s one here there’s one here there’s one at the back here there’s one on the inside there so that’s what i’m looking for when i prune it i want to leave some nodes on it so the new branches will come out wherever the old leaves were so i’m thinking probably cutting it off here and then i’ve got a lot of branches possibilities on the remaining part of the branch here or trunk yeah so some are right about here so i’ll get out the pruners and we’ll start pruning the tree up all right so yeah there’s a leaf bud there there there’s one at the back one at the front here there’s one on the inside here one here so i don’t want to you know too tall a straight section so i’m thinking of pruning it right about here this allows a bit of room for die back actually i’ll go a little higher all right here i go here comes a tall leader big cut coming up just like that so there’s the length of that branch it’s a good good couple of meters long i still have a lot of sprawling branches on the tree that need pruning back also so i’m going to prune back the new growth on this apex first and again i’m looking for buds facing a suitable direction so i think i’ll prune this one to right here like that this upright one uh i’ll go to here like that and then i’ve got a lot of branches in the other areas and they’ll need pruning back also so i’ll come around the front all right i i didn’t really want this front branch to grow but i’m letting it grow because my only live vein on the tree is this one the one off to the right hand side and this one out front so i’m keeping as much living material on the tree as i can so i’m going to prune this off i think right here there’s a there’s a downward facing bud here so i’m going to prune it off here like that uh this one here this one to here like that and i’m not going to touch that one it’s too small this one will get pruned though to here next i’ve got all the living parts to the right hand side of the tree that needs pruning back so i’ll do that this one’s a nice branch this is kind of the branch leader here so i’ll leave it a little longer i’ll go to ah maybe here like that that one to there this one to two right short here like that this one to here this back one i’m gonna go to here this one to here to here here here that’s got most of these branches all pruned up now oh except for this one i’ll go to here it’s tough to know you know how short you make these i could prune them really far back but i wanted that i want the tree to keep some vigor in it i don’t want to until it’s really growing well and fully recovered a lot of bark peeling off here dead parts of dead wood coming off here my goal with the rotted part of this tree is that the new roots will grow into that rotted wood from the living part of the tree and i’ve seen this happen on a lot of trees so you eventually replace all that rotted wood with roots and as the wood rots away it exposes the roots and you get this really cool tangled root system going down the trunk of the tree i’ve seen it in willows and i’ve seen it in some apple trees so i’m hoping that happens on this tree that i as the wood rots away it exposes all these nice roots that are growing into this dead wood here’s a look at the tree now it’s ready to grow in spring i was hoping to do a little weeding but a lot of the soil is still frozen so i’ve got to wait maybe tomorrow i can do a bit of weeding on it but it’s just too much ice in the surface here and i can’t get it anything yeah so hopefully i’ll have a good season with the apple tree of growth uh yeah we’ll try and make something out of this apple tree that kind of all died back [Music] we had a very mild winter this year at the coldest it got down to was about minus 18 or 19 degrees celsius so i left the apple tree out on the bench all winter and it seems to be fine all the cuts are nice and green the wood it seems to be living so that’s good um i’ll get out the uh fuji now the one i pruned up yesterday and we’ll have a look at it on the bench here with the black background here’s a look at my cathedral style fuja so i’ll rotate it around so you can see it so this is kind of the front of the tree here so i’m trying to make the tree look good from all directions i’m back to the front i went for a nice bike ride yesterday afternoon i went out for about an hour and i think today i’ll do the same i might even get the road bike out today before i do that i want to try starting the truck this will be the first time it’s started since fall so i’ll keep my fingers crossed hopefully the battery’s got some power and we’ll go we’ll go try it out the bed of the truck is filled with snow so i’m going to shovel it out that’ll be my first job on the truck for today down here you can see all the snow melting in the back of the bed and dripping down so here’s a look so not too much snow in here it used to be quite full but it’s a lot of it’s melted already so yeah i’ll get this shoveled out all right that’ll do the next task i uh finished up last fall by insulating the plant room and i have a bag of insulation over here [Applause] and you know truck makes a great storage area for the winter so that’s where the insulation went it’s inside the truck here so i got to get that out i got my spare fuel tank or my new fuel tank in the back here so i’ll be putting that in this year yeah so i’ve got to get this insulation out of here and i think it’s going in the back that’s why i shoveled out the back of the bed here so i can put the insulation here just for now and then i’ll put it back in after we try starting the truck all right i have the insulation in the back here looks in good shape yeah so i can finish insulating the plant room all the area above the porch area this spring so here’s the truck looks like it’s doing well let’s get in and see if there’s any battery power all right i’m in i’ve got the key let’s close the door key in got a burr on me here wow they’re sharp and prickly all right it’s in neutral pumper three times maybe four see if there’s any battery power here we go wow looks like there’s plenty of battery power it’s just got no gas in the system so i’ll pump the carburetor a few times keep trying there we go that worked really nicely well that started really well i’m happy it’s not insured yet so i can’t take it on the road but there’s still salting the road so i don’t want to take it out yet i’ll wait till the weather gets nice once you get a few rains to kind of wash all the salty stuff off the road then it’s safe to take the vehicles out oh it’s running really good yeah that’s fantastic all right i will drive it up and down the driveway a bit just to make sure the brakes are freed up in that so i’ll move the little micra let me see if this thing idles seems to be idling quite nicely so i’ll move the micro and we’ll come back and we’ll just drive it up and down the driveway a bit this reminds me when i was a kid my dad used to let me drive the car up and down the driveway all right here we go putting her in reverse [Music] and it’s moving awesome oh and we’re slipping on ice brakes feel good everything’s looking good i’m checking out the tire tracks here from the the mud terrain tires they really grip in don’t they yeah so there’s the ice i was sliding on there and over here [Music] so well that was kind of nice getting the truck out once again i managed to get the truck started and running i’m gonna try the matrix now i think this battery will be flat but we’ll see still unlocks [Music] nothing [Music] i didn’t have the clutch push push down enough with my boots on all right so yeah i’m going to get the matrix on the road for the summer um the micro just have to sit uh till next winter yeah so i got to get some gas in the matrix yeah with my big boots on i couldn’t push the clutch down far enough to get it started i thought it was dead the battery but that’s good that’s good everything’s running well there’s only one last thing to do today and that’s to get out and go biking such a beautiful day i’m going to try and pick out a tree to work on tomorrow and i was thinking maybe my witch’s tree over here right here you can see how long it’s grown so my plan is to prune this back every year hard prune it have it regrow prune it back regrow until i get this really old gnarled witches type tree so a lot of dead wood on it something that really looks like it’s been struggling for life for many many years i also have my little spirit cedar tree over here and again that’s the whole purpose of this tree is to make it look like it’s had a hard life and it’s survived throughout all the struggles of life so that’ll be cool so i think yeah maybe i’ll get out the two little cedars tomorrow get them on the bench and start working on them eric from the makerspace emailed me yesterday and said my nati my avatar figure is finished and looks good and they’re starting to work on the frozen elsa figurine so that that’ll be cool i’ll be able to pick those up soon and that’s all for today i’m nigel saunders thanks for joining me in the bonsai zone
