Not so Lonesome Pines

Posted on February 7, 2026 by sunnydunny

Pinus cembroides, the Mexican Pinyon Pine is a small, bushy tree, quite often featuring a twisted trunk. It’s cultivated for its large, edible seeds, the piñones. My specimen is quite high on the cuteness scale, but to be honest, the weather has been so wet since I got it that I haven’t had time to take a really close look at it, to get ideas on how it might be developed. It’ll definitely stay compact.

Pinus cembroides

Japan is known for three Pine species. Pinus parviflora, the White Pine, is the high altitude specialist which I saw growing on Mount Fuji. Pinus thunbergii, the Black Pine, is the one which thrives at lower altitudes, as in the temple gardens of Kyoto, or the Imperial Palace grounds in Tokyo. In the middle, as it were, is the Red Pine, Pinus densiflora. Its needles are sometimes shaggy, but the ones on my specimen appear to have been trimmed. There are a few suspiciously long needles which have missed the scissors – you know what some barbers are like. I’ll need to wait for new growth to appear, to assess what I need to do with it, but I don’t like the thought of trimming needles. This one’s very high on the cuteness scale too.

Pinus densiflora

In 79 AD, Pliny the Elder described the initial eruption of Vesuvius which, sadly, killed him a few days later. He said that the eruptive column was like a pine tree which, to those of us familiar with the Scots Pine (Pinus sylvestris) might cause us to wonder what Pliny was talking about. The cloud looks nothing like a Scots Pine. However, the Stone Pine or Umbrella Pine, Pinus pinea, is a Mediterranean species Pliny would have known well, its distinctive mushroom head top not too dissimilar to the dreadful hot cloud above the mountain. Pliny ‘s name is commemorated in the name for very explosive volcanic eruptions – Plinian. My specimen’s a young one, with a dauntingly shaggy trunk. When it’s had time to develop side branches, I’m going to have to remove the needles from the trunk and proximal ends of branches, but that’s a few years ahead.

Pinus pinea

I’ve sown seed of Pinus mugo, the Dwarf Mountain Pine, and one seedling has germinated so far. That may be the only one I’ll get.

Pinus thunbergii, the Japanese Black Pine, is the ruffian of my new acquisitions, its trunk cloaked, like a green Highland coo, in long green needles. It definitely has character. I don’t want to force it into an unnatural habit, because that seems like verging on cruelty to trees, but I can see myself in a few years, as it loses old needles from the whippy trunk, wiring it up to make an S-bend, the archetypal ‘informal upright’ or moyogi style bonsai.

Pinus thunbergii

I already had some Japanese Black Pine in the garden, from seed sown many years ago. They’re growing in a container on the patio. From time to time I think about separating them. I’ll see what I feel like in a month or so. They’re also too tall, with too much growth concentrated near the top. A bit of judicious de-candling in early summer should encourage back-budding lower down.

In the meantime I’m held back, from my trees, from my seed trays, from my overwintering seedlings, from the garden generally, by four weeks of dark, cold, wet days. I can’t remember anything like this happening before. Is it the end of days? Is there really a sun somewhere? I’m really feeling the lack of sunshine. The thick cloud cover means there isn’t enough light coming in the front window to warm the seed trays on the windowsill, so germination is very poor. I’m using grow lights, which provide light of the right frequencies for the seedlings, but they can’t provide the soil with any warmth. It’s the same with the seed trays outside, in the mini-greenhouse. None of them have shown any sign of germination. I’m beginning to think about the effect of constant cloud cover on phytoplankton productivity in the North Sea. Will we have fewer fish later on? Skinnier fish?

I’m not good at tree photography, but I’m trying to improve my shots. I’m wondering if it’s best if I use a single camera for all my tree shots, and if so, which camera? Not the small Lumix, but maybe the bridge camera? I’ll try some shots. Or maybe the phone? And I need to take them against a neutral background, so I’ve ordered a plain grey noticeboard I can use. Fundamentally, they are to document the collection as it grows and develops.

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Four Firs

Posted on February 5, 2026 by sunnydunny

The Pine family, Pinaceae, includes a number of distinctly different genera – Abies (Firs), Cedrus (true Cedars), Larix (Larches), Picea (Spruces) Pinus (Pines), Pseudolarix (Golden Larch), Pseudotsuga (Douglas Fir) and Tsuga (Hemlocks). Looking at the new trees I’ve acquired recently, I realised that whereas the Pines are well represented, I was short on Firs, that varied and distinctive group. So, I’ve acquired a few new ones, for bonsai and other uses.

What makes Firs Firs? Generally, their leaves (needles) are shorter and stiffer than Pines. Their cones sit upright on the branches, and tend to break apart, shedding seeds as they do so. When Fir needles fall, they leave a round, flat scar on the twig. Pine needles grow in groups of two, three or five, with each group having a basal sheath. Spruce needles grow from a small, woody peg, and Larches are deciduous. That’s enough to be going on with. What are Christmas trees, you ask? They are trees you buy at Christmas.

Let’s start with the Firs, then. The Korean Fir, Abies koreana, is the smallest (and cutest) Fir. It’s conical, compact and slow-growing so it’s an ideal tree for bonsai. It has short, stubby needles, and is an attractive tree at any size. Bonsai specimens bought from specialist nurseries tend to be on the expensive side, so cheapskate me usually goes for general nursery plants which I can train my way.

Fraser’s Fir, Abies fraseri, grows in the Great Smoky Mountains of Eastern USA. It’s quite fast-growing, so no doubt it will be a challenge to grow as a bonsai.

Abies lasiocarpa var. arizonica, the Corkbark Fir, grows in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado and south into Arizona. I suspect it’ll be another challenging species to grow as a bonsai.

The last of my new ones is the Grand Fir, Abies grandis. It’s one of the giants of the western North American forests, and was one of many plants discovered by the Perthshire plant collector David Douglas, employed by the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh to collect seeds of new species and to bring them back to Scotland.

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Seedlings

Posted on February 2, 2026 by sunnydunny

I’ve removed the most vigorous seedlings from their little seed tray, where they were definitely looking crowded, and potted them up into individual cells (conifers) or pots (broadleaves). Sixteen conifer seedlings have been moved on. It’s too early to identify them, but some, I’m sure, are Swamp Cypresses, one or two others probably Spruces, and the rest I’ll have to wait and see.

This is the depleted tray, with quite a lot still to germinate.

And this is the the tray of little conifer seedlings.

One of the broadleaves I’ve potted up could be a Zelkova, another might be Small-Leaved Lime, Tilia cordata. Too early to be certain, but the first true leaf is definitely cordate. In one of my other trays, I’ve got the first seedling of the Mountain Pine, Pinus mugo. I’ll be happy with just two or three of these for bonsai, but we’ll see.

In the tray I found a Ginkgo seed which wasn’t doing anything, so I’ve put it in a pot on its own, in case it decides to germinate. I’m sure there’s a Stone Pine seed in there somewhere too, but I’m not going to rake around for it and disturb some of the other seeds, There’s definitely a maple seed – they’re unmistakeable.

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Bonsai diary

Posted on February 1, 2026 by sunnydunny

Bonsai diary, from 27/01/2026

Back in October I sowed a packet of ‘Mixed bonsai’ seed, and while many are still invisible in the tray, waiting for warmth and light to trigger their push through the surface layer of vermiculite, some have started to germinate. I recognise Taxodium distichum, the Swampies I did so well with last year. I count eleven seedlings. Most appear to be broadleaves, and many still have cotyledons sheathed in seedcases, but two have started to grow their true leaves. I’m fairly sure one is a Zelkova, another I don’t recognise. It has a lovely heart-shaped Soon I’ll have to prick out these vigorous ones, leave room for smaller, shyer newcomers, and those still sleeping under ground.

I should check the trays outside, the ones under the bench, and those in the mini-greenhouse, but today Storm Chandra’s high winds and rain demand prudence and patience. It will dry up and calm down in a few days. Meanwhile in a seed tray on the windowsill, cells sown months ago with Pinus mugo (Mountain Pine), Juniperus virginiana (Eastern Red Cedar) and Carpinus turczaninovii (Korean Hornbeam) are beginning to stir; five Juniper seedlings have emerged already. In a half tray beside them, the surface soil has become uneven and lumpy, suggesting some movement of Abies koreana (Korean Fir) below the soil. I hope some will germinate; I had no luck with two batches last year.

Later:
I’ve been thinking about the classical Japanese bonsai styles. Many of them are similar to my thoughts on developing miniature trees to suggest natural ones. Formal and informal upright, slanting, broom style, bunjin or literati, root over rock, root on rock and windswept are all examples of trees I’ve seen in nature, as are multiple trunks and forests. Cascade and semi-cascade don’t appeal to me, nor do split trunk or driftwood styles. When I think about it, the styles with rocks never quite look right to me, so it’s unlikely I will try them.

Same with techniques. Wiring seems all right to me, but I’ll use it sparingly. Clip and grow I understand, and I will use it. I won’t use jinning. If branches die in nature, that’s one thing, but I couldn’t destroy a branch just to create an effect. Ditto with sharimiki – it’s not for me.

29/01/2026
I’ve started to think about pricking out some of the seedlings in the ‘mixed bonsai’ tray. I’ll need to fill a ‘cellular tray’ with compost, as I don’t have any really small pots.

31/01/2026
I didn’t get any further with pricking out the seedlings. The weather this past week has been too cold, wet and windy to even think about going out in it. Today though, I did prune my Pseudolarix amabilis (Chinese Golden Larch). I cut off all dead branches and removed some that were growing at odd angles or directions. It’s in good shape for the new season. It was a light pruning, so I think I will repot it in March, when it starts to come into growth. I’m going to put it under the bench tomorrow, as it’s had a lot of water recently. I also sprayed the seed trays in the mini-greenhouse.

Looking at my plant collection as a whole, while I have a good number of Pine species, and a reasonable number of Spruce as seeds, I’d like a number of Firs to balance things out. I looked again at the Yarrow Gardens site, and I’ve ordered some more plants – Abies fraseri, grandis, koreana and lasiocarpa, plus a Sequoia sempervirens in case my seeds don’t germinate (they were older seeds).

01/02/2026
February at last, but there’s still no change in the weather – it’s dull, dark and dismal. I got over a cold about two weeks ago, but I’ve come down with another one, and this one feels worse than last time. Last night I found a ginkgo seed in the ‘Mixed bonsai’ tray. I’ll put it in a small pot on its own, as the soil in this tray is obviously too shallow for it. I’m sure there was a Stone Pine seed in the mix too, so I’ll do the same for it if I find it.

I looked at the photos I took recently and decided that most of them aren’t good enough. I took them with my small Lumix camera, and I’m sure my phone takes better pics. I’ll try again with that, and also my Lumix bridge camera. I also need to find a neutral background for my photos.

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Do you grow Broadleaves?

Posted on January 24, 2026 by sunnydunny

Oh, thank you for asking. Actually I do. Perhaps not as many as the conifers, but I definitely grow broadleaved trees too. Shrubs as well, but they would mostly be for the garden. I had a sort of flowering windbreak at the front of my front garden. Facing the pavement, if I’d had a pavement, but somehow the builders must have run out of pavement stuff. The cul-de-sac roadway is in front of my front garden kerb. It’s mainly flowering shrubs, only it’s become a bit sparse over the years. Things have died, I have a Hebe on its last legs, several gaps, a Berberis darwinii which some thrush must have digested, then voided in a conveniently fertile open space. It’s not a particularly interesting subject and, to be honest, it’s a bit too vigorous, so if the rain ever stops, I’ve made up my mind to remove it.

I’ll replace it with a Smokebush, Cotinus coggygria, which I’ve recently bought. I also bought a Strawberry Tree, Arbutus unedo, which I might grow as a bonsai, or I could plant it to replace the Hebe, if the latter pops its clogs in the next year. Strictly, it’s a small tree, a member of the Ericaceae, with the white bell-like flowers typical of that family, and red fruits which might, if one was extremely short-sighted, mistake for a strawberry. But not if you ate one. If my Chinese Redbud (Cercis chinensis) seed germinates, I’ll definitely plant one in a gap, and maybe a Pyracantha coccinea, which I’m also growing from seed. I know Pyracantha makes a good bonsai subject.

Other seed which I’m definitely growing as bonsai if they germinate, are Acers – palmatum, buergerianum and cissifolium, Birches – Japanese White and River, Hornbeams, a Japanese Quince, Euonymus, Crepe Myrtle, White Mulberry, Small-leafed Lime and a Sakhalin Elder. The last one would combine my love of geology, specifically volcanoes, with plants.

It’s a smaller list than for conifers, but I think there are some interesting plants there. One aspect I have to consider is that some of these require longer stratification periods than the bulk of the conifer seeds, but I rely on a spreadsheet to keep track of them all. I do aim to have them all sown in trays by the end of March. Some already have been sown.

As far as plants go, I only have two specimens of indoor bonsai, and one of them is Ehretia (Syn. Carmona) microphylla, the Fukien Tea plant. I bought it as a bonsai from a Scottish nursery on a whim, just because I saw it listed. Peter Chan, doyen of British bonsai growers, advises people in the UK against trying it, because it’s so tender. ‘Don’t buy it, because it’ll die on you,’ is the gist of his advice, but I bought it anyway. The genus name commemorates Georg Dionysius Ehret, an 18th century German botanist and superb botanical illustrator. I remember admiring his illustrations in one of the books in the RGBE Library, when I was Chief Librarian, and I suppose that might have been in a factor in my decision to buy the specimen, but it wasn’t the only one. It has small leaves (hence the name) and its angular branching habit already make it look like a miniature tree. It has glossy leaves and small white flowers, and is altogether an attractive plant. It definitely is, as Peter Chan says, tender, and so it shares my windowsill with figures of the Kamakura Buddha and Ganesha, and with ceramics from Kyoto and Fergus Stewart of Lochinver.

Meanwhile (below), overwintering in our unheated garden room is Podocarpus macrophyllus, which is much less tender, but which wouldn’t survive a Scottish winter. Also Jane’s bonsai, a Chinese Elm (Ulmus parviflora), which restarted my interest in bonsai. It has lost most of its leaves, but it will be no worse for that.

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Rare, unusual and endangered conifers

Posted on January 21, 2026 by sunnydunny

Many will know that I worked for nearly fifteen years (1988-2002) at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE), first as Chief Librarian and later in senior management. I had known ‘The Botanics’ since early childhood, however. My mother used to take my brother and I there, from the late 1940s and into the ’50s. I’ve retained my love of the place even now.

It’s maybe ironic but I recall, if I was feeling particularly stressed in my job as Edinburgh Librarian of the British Geological Survey (1973-1988) I’d drive down to The Botanics and walk among the trees. Then I was appointed Chief Librarian of the organisation, which came with its own stresses, but still I walked among the trees and felt better for it. Further, I could always visit the other three gardens within RBGE, at Benmore, Dawyck and Logan, and some of the trees there were EVEN BIGGER! Later I was seconded into the position of Garden Secretary in, I think, 1998 (I could never write an autobiography, because I’ve never kept a diary!). Reader, I loved that job (although later I moved even higher within management). As head of Admin and responsible for managing relations between ourselves and our funding body, the Scottish government, it broadened my interests and experience of different sides of the Garden: Science, Horticulture, Administration, Education and more. Of course there was more stress, but I had learned to deal with it.

One of the research programmes I took an interest in was the International Conifer Conservation Programme. Everyone knows pines, larches, spruces and yews, but there are many less familiar conifer families with member species you don’t come across in everyday (for me) Scottish landscapes. I’d love to see them. I think about the Fitzroya and Araucaria forests of Chile, but I know I’ll not get there. I love seeing trees in landscapes, gardens and arboreta. I’m fascinated by trees which are ancient relics, such as the Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides), the Gingko (Ginkgo biloba) and the Wollemi Pine (Wollemia nobilis). I’ve got one Dawn Redwood seedling, and a Ginkgo grown from a seed sent by a Japanese friend in Kyoto to my late dear friend, the poet Gerry Loose. It sits in a splendid large ceramic pot. I don’t have ambitions to grow a Wollemi, but I’m glad I’ve seen one. Jane and I had a memorable visit to Qinghai, China’s sub-Arctic province on the Tibetan Plateau, back in 2007, so I was happy to find seed of the Qinghai Spruce (Picea crassifolia), so I’ve sown that, together with the Lijiang Spruce (Picea likiangensis) from Yunnan. I’m intrigued by Plum Yews, so I sowed seed of the Chinese one, Cephalotaxus fortuniei, named for the Scottish plant hunter, Robert Fortune.

I don’t grow rare trees because of their rarity, but for their botanical or horticultural interest. I recently bought a one-year old seedling of the endemic Tasmanian conifer, Athrotaxis selaginoides, which I’m nurturing in the mini-greenhouse. The last time I saw an adult tree was at the Benmore Botanic Garden, and its hillside setting is wonderful. I can’t replicate that in my back garden, but maybe in a bonsai pot? Sciadopytis verticillata, the Japanese Umbrella Pine is unusual in cultivation, but not all that rare in habitat. This tree isn’t suitable for bonsai, so it’s planted in the ground. Other unusual species I have as plants or as seeds may not become bonsai either, but I may decide to grow on in pots and containers. These include the Incense Cedar, Calocedrus decurrens, because it’s a tall, columnar species, and the Chinese Fir, Cunninghamia lanceolata, because its leaves might be too large for bonsai. We’ll see.

I may have become obsessed by bonsai recently, but I haven’t given up my older interest in the Cactaceae. My cactus collection shares its bench with the conifers, overwintering as usual in multiple layers of fleece and bubble wrap. Thankfully it won’t be too long until March, when I can unwrap them and let them have the Spring sunlight they need to flower in May and June.

Young Dawn Redwood in Rosemount Park, Linlithgow, 2025.

Echinocereus.

Athrotaxis selaginoides, King William Pine, and yes, that’s my thumb.

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Small trees

Posted on January 20, 2026 by sunnydunny

Most bonsai practitioners acquire plant material through growing from seed, collecting trees from the wild, or by purchasing bonsai specimens from specialist bonsai or nursery material from garden centres. I’ll look at each of these.

In my own case, as I’ve mentioned in a previous post, I do grow from seed, and it’s always exciting to see the first signs of germination in seed trays. Even before the first seed leaves emerge, the compost in the trays begins to change from being flat and level to being uneven, with some areas becoming raised as the cotyledons below begin to exert upward pressure.

Let’s discuss ‘wild-collected’ next. Under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 you must not: Uproot any wild plant without the landowner’s permission, or intentionally pick, uproot, or destroy any plant listed on Schedule 8 (rare and protected species). You may: pick flowers, leaves, fruits, seeds, or fungi for personal use, if the plant is not protected. You may collect from land where you have permission, and you may collect fallen material (e.g. windfall seeds, cones). Seed collection is not permitted on private land, in NNRs, SSSIs or nature reserves managed by organisations such as NatureScot, NTS or Wildlife Trusts. That seems pretty clear to me, and eminently sensible.

What you collect in your own garden is fine, however, and I’ve got several self-sown specimens I’d otherwise have recycled as weeds. They include a nice little Cotoneaster seedling growing in a crevice of a rockery boulder next to the parent shrub, an apple tree seedling growing below the big ornamental apple tree, and an ash tree – whose seeds get everywhere. I’ll look for a suitable lump of sandstone for the Cotoneaster, so I can grow it in the Root-Over-Rock style, and they’re all overwintering in the mini-greenhouse, along with an acorn and seeds from a crab apple I picked up from the ground.

I’ve bought two bonsai specimens from my local garden centre, and several young trees from plant nurseries. Some were plugs which I’ve potted up, and a few others were in small growing pots. Those I’ve put into larger pots. I haven’t purchased bonsai trees from the major bonsai nurseries because (1) I’d be reluctant to risk buying such expensive plants given that I’m a newcomer to bonsai, and I might not be able to raise them successfully, and (2) that the nurseries will already have given the trees some bonsai training, and it might not be the sort of training – shaping, wiring, pruning – that I would want to use when developing them in the more naturalistic way I’d prefer.

I’ve bought several trees from plant nurseries, because (1) they’re more reasonably priced, (2) I know what I’m getting because I’ve seen photos of the actual trees on the websites, and (3) because they’re younger plants, with more options open for development. Here are some examples:

Mexican Pinyon Pine, Pinus cembroides. A lovely wee tree, with lots of potential. A bit dearer than the two below, but worth it.

An Atlas (or Atlantic) Cedar, Cedrus atlantica. I’ve already potted this up in a free-draining compost.

A Douglas Fir, Pseudotsuga menziesii. I love the bark on mature trees.

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Trees in nature and cultivation

Posted on January 19, 2026 by sunnydunny

Looking back, I’ve taken lots of photos of trees in natural landscapes, in planted woodlands or in the grounds of grand estates. I’ve got photos of old growth Scots Pine (Pinus sylvestris) in the Cairngorms and younger ones in my local John Muir Country Park. I’ve recorded wind-blown gnarly Japanese White Pine (P. parviflora) on the upper slopes of Mount Fuji, and classically manicured Japanese Black Pine (P. thunbergii) in the garden of the Silver Temple in Kyoto. There’s a photo of me hugging a massive Noble Fir (Abies procera) at Cragside, and I know I hugged a Coastal Redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) at Big Sur, on the California Coastal Highway. We’ve got some big and beautiful trees locally, by the Secret Lake on the Smeaton Estate; trees like King Boris’s Fir (Abies borisii-regis) and Western Red Cedar (Thuja plicata). I love trees; I always have. The largest of them inspire awe and wonder; and all of them reflect tenacity, persistence and, to my eyes anyway, beauty.

Japanese White Pine above Mount Fuji’s Fifth Station.

Globally, trees produce 50-80 million metric tons of pollen per year, and while there is no single comparable figure for total tree seed tonnage, it too must be in the tens of millions. That’s a phenomenal level of productivity, and trees have evolved it to take account, mostly, of the vagaries and uncertainties of wind pollination. The odds of (1) pollination, (2) dispersal and landing of seeds in a suitable substrate without being eaten or otherwise destroyed and (3) germination are vanishingly small, so they have to massively overproduce their heritable genes. Gardeners, arborists and commercial growers can hugely increase the numbers of trees through seed collection, germination and cultivation, plus scientific interventions (as for the Wollemi Pine), and that’s a bonus.

All my life I’ve grown flowers and vegetables from seed, in gardens and in the allotment at Thistly Cross, and although I’ve recently given up the allotment, I’ve still got the garden and I’ve now taken up growing trees from seed, both for the garden and for bonsai. In 2025 I bought around 30 packets of seeds. Those sown earlier in the year have produced several seedlings with varying rates of germination success, and I still have a large number of seeds and seedlings at different stages in my mini-greenhouse and on my windowsill.

Swamp Cypress (Taxodium distichum) (above), Giant Redwood (Sequoiadendron giganteum) (lower right) and Cryptomeria japonica (lower left) seedlings. I still find it amazing that tender little things like these have the potential to grow into large trees.

My best germination rate was for the Swampies – Taxodium distichum. I planted about 30 seeds, germinated 13, two of which died. I’m left with 11 delightful little conifers in 3-inch pots. They dropped their leaves in late Autumn and they’re now overwintering. I can see tiny little nodal buds already, and I’ll watch their progress. I have 4 Giant Redwood (Sequoiadendron giganteum) seedlings, and 4 Black Spruce (Picea mariana).

Most conifer seeds, and many broadleaf seeds, require a period of winter dormancy before they can germinate. The seed treatment process is called stratification, and requires storing the damp seeds in a fridge or outdoors in an unheated greenhouse or cold frame. My seeds for 2026 are in a mini-greenhouse, which protects them from rain and high winds. After several weeks (or months in some cases), they’ll be sown in trays to germinate in late Winter/early Spring.

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The Bonsai Obsession

Posted on January 18, 2026 by sunnydunny

I’ve always liked looking at bonsai trees, and over the years I’ve grown a few, but I can’t honestly remember much about those early forays into the craft. I still have some bonsai pots from that period, however. Last year though, last April to be exact, Jane was given a bonsai tree as a birthday present, and it sparked off a curiosity in me which rapidly grew into an interest, a fascination and now an obsession. Jane’s one is a Chinese elm, Ulmus parviflora, misleadingly labelled as a Zelkova – which it clearly isn’t. I bought two bonsai trees for myself, a Golden Larch (Pseudolarix amabilis) and, since I’ve got an interest in rare and unusual plants, a Podocarpus macrophylla, commonly mis-named Buddha Pine, which isn’t a pine, and has hee-haw to do with the Enlightened One.

By the summer I had invested in some other conifers and planted them in the garden to create a ‘Japanese Corner’ which contained a Japanese Umbrella Pine (Sciadopitys verticillata), a Hinoki Cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa) and a Japanese Cedar (Cryptomeria japonica), These are all slow-growing varieties, and still small, but I have not cultivated them as bonsai – they will take their own shapes as they grow, and I won’t interfere with the process.

A word on nomenclature, if I may; from my years working at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh I have been used to dealing with plants by their scientific names, and I carry this forward today. Others may talk in terms of ‘common names’, but these are only common in the language and country in which they are used, and even then their usage is often loose. The only universal name, the unequivocal singular and international reference name, is the scientific name, a binomial consisting of the names of genus and species, which, according to botanical naming convention, are in Latin. That makes perfect sense to me. Take the word ‘Cedar’ for example. It has been applied to trees in many different genera, simply because all their timbers have a pleasant resinous scent – the scent of ‘cedarwood’. But an examination of some of the trees labelled ‘Cedar’ quickly shows how unrelated most of them are to the true cedars, those in the genus Cedrus.

I began buying seeds of conifers and other trees I could cultivate as bonsai, and I also purchased other conifers from specialist nurseries. By the end of December 2025 I had a collection of 32 trees which I’m happy to work on into the future, and about the same number of seed collections, mainly of coniferous species.

I’ve also watched innumerable videos by bonsai growers – Heron’s Bonsai, Bonsai Empire, Nigel Saunders, Notion Bonsai, Xavier’s Bonsai Retreat to name a few. It’s interesting, and it’s helped to clarify my own thoughts as to the approach I take in growing the trees in my collection. Classical Japanese bonsai are grouped in a number of styles for example – Formal and Informal Upright, Cascade, Windswept, Literati, Root on Rock etc. It may seem heretical to some, but I don’t particularly want to grow my trees just so they fit within a stylistic category. I want to grow miniature trees in ways which are true to their wild cousins in their natural landscapes. My approach to cultivation techniques is similar. I may wire branches and trunks so that they look as if they’ve grown naturally into the shapes I’ve given them. I can clip and grow to make shaped specimens, with branches which divide semi-naturally. I have no interest in making ‘jin’ dead branches. That feels like cruelty to me, and I can’t abide that in the animal kingdom, so why should I employ it in the botanical one?

This blog is going to take me away from my previous subjects for a while, but it is, as I have admitted, an obsession. Future postings are likely to contain photographs, because I do want to document my collection, and the progress of the trees as they develop. I won’t entirely neglect geology, literature, physics or other topics, but we’ll see where the mood takes me.

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California 2023. One: Basin and Range

Posted on March 28, 2023 by sunnydunny

Northern California is a textbook example of Basin and Range topography, which I remembered from my geology studies with the Open University. A series of linear north-south mountain ranges, sloping down to foothills and flat valley bottoms. It’s characteristic of extensional tectonics, with fault-slip bounded basins. Somewhere, way underneath the floor, there’s heat, and in places in places magma, which surprises us with hot springs and steam vents. In the ranges the crustal blocks have rotated, one edge dipped, the other lifted. In this region the bounding foreland is the chain of the Sierra Nevada granite mountains.

Thick alluvium fills the valley floors, perfect for agriculture. Here in Sonoma it’s mostly vineyards. Field after field is marshalled into tows of T-shaped vines, single-trunked and double-branched, wired together for support. In early March, it’s too early for the leaves and the flower- and fruit-bearing side shoots. The vines are underplanted with mustard and another golden yellow flower I can’t identify from this distance. The recent weather has been so bad that many of the field edges are flooded. On a larger scale, the low ground between Vallejo and Sacramento is sodden and waterlogged. Fine weather for ducks, as the saying goes, and there are large numbers of them in the roadside ponds and channels.

The Russian River is bank-full and close to overtopping. It is fast-flowing, muddy, opaque. It hasn’t got much further to go though. From here it tips its sediment load into the mighty Pacific near Jenner-By-the-Sea. It will discolour the ocean quite far out this year, thanks to the atmospheric rivers of rain which have deluged the State of California for weeks now.

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