"...Bringing pleasure and inspiration ... after we are gone..."

     In a January post, I shared an announcement from the Matthaei Botanical Gardens in Ann Arbor, Michigan: they are developing a permanent bonsai garden to house the Matthaei-Nicholls Bonsai Collection. The garden will be open to the public, and will help spread the knowledge and enjoyment of bonsai in the lower Great Lakes region. (See this post.)

Now the Matthaei-Nicholls Collection has obtained a dozen fine bonsai from Jack Wikle of Tecumseh, MI. Jack is a long-time bonsai artist, teacher, and lecturer, who first encountered bonsai while on military service in Japan. He went on to earn an MA in horticulture, and became one of the moving forces in the growth of the bonsai community in the USA. My personal debt to him, for all I have learned from his writings and his

Ft. Wayne Bonsai Club Spring Show

    Yesterday, May 12th, the Fort Wayne Bonsai Club held our annual Spring Show, at the Foellinger-Freimann Botanical Conservatory in downtown Fort Wayne, Indiana. Yes, the venue's name is a mouthful, but the good thing is that the Conservatory is as well-designed and appealing as its name is intimidating.

"Show" may not quite convey how informal this event is. There is no judging, except that each visitor is asked to leave a little square of pink paper beside the composition he or she likes the most. (Tallying the slips at the end of the day also gives us a pretty good idea of how many people came thru.) Club members also vote, separately and anonymously, for "best tree." There are no prizes, just congratulations to the winners. We ask that entries be in bonsai pots (please, no plastic) or on slabs, and that members clean up their trees and pots beforehand. And that's it. So maybe it would be better to call it a "display" than a "show." But whatever you call it, we had a great time. Maybe more important, the visitors appeared to find it all interesting.

Between conversations with visitors, I snapped a few pictures.

Baby Mantids

     Jim and Wendy, neighbors across the street, ordered a praying-mantis egg case so their children could see the babies  (known as nymphs) hatch out. That "blessed event" happened this afternoon, and several neighborhood children got to see and handle the hatchlings. It was the first time I had seen new-hatched

A Fig's New Home

I started trimming, then remembered to get a "before" picture!

Remember my little veldt fig (Ficus burtt-davyi) that I planned to repot in February? (See here.) With one thing and another, I didn't get to it until yesterday. The tree didn't suffer: it continued to enjoy the conditions in the Crate, so much so that both top and roots got pretty shaggy! Roots were dangling over the pot sides and down thru the grate, and some branches were starting to turn lianescent: growing like fast woody vines. F. burtt-davyi will do that, I've discovered, in high humidity and with plenty of fertilizer.

Foliage trimmed. (Forgive the picture quality.)

The new pot is this tree's permanent home. It was purchased from Sara Rayner of Sara Rayner Pottery (link,) specifically for this tree. Sara recommended the color, and when I saw the tree in the pot, I almost took a step back: she was right! This pot's size fits this bonsai well, too. (I  learned a bit more about estimating pot size this time around; I had feared this pot might be too small.)

The mix is a 5:3:2 blend of scoria, composted bark, and Turface; all particles are between 2 mm. and 3 mm. in size. Uniformity of particle size makes for better aeration, and makes it easier to discern the effects of any changes in watering or fertilizing.