Repotting a young exposed root pine – Bonsai Tonight

Last week I received a reminder that it’s time to repot the pines in my garden.

Strong winds had knocked over a young exposed root pine revealing lots of new roots.

Broken pot

My favorite time to repot pines is after the roots start growing but before the buds begin to open so the timing couldn’t have been better.

Here’s a close-up of the new roots.

White and yellow roots indicate recent root growth

The first step was removing the mat of roots at the bottom of the rootball.

Mat of circling roots

After removing the new roots

I pulled away all of the circling roots until I could see bonsai soil peeking through between the roots.

Root-work complete

I used a slightly larger pot to better stabilize the tree, but I’ll need a larger pot before long as young pines grow quickly.

After repotting

As this was a good time for adding curves to the trunk, I applied some heavy aluminum wire and made some bends.

After wiring – 12″

That’s all the work the tree will need for a while. I plan to let it grow freely until fall at which point I may wire some of the new branches.