First styling of a Picea Bonsai by Andrea Junger filmed by Merlin

I thought this video well worth of sharing.  Nice material and as all of Merlin's videos the camera work is great.  He posts a lot of good bonsai videos on his youtube channel, so go and have a look https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYPwjZg4XT2pGgrC69v3RRg

All his videos are in German, but the pictures speak for themselves.

What a difference a week makes

It's been a while since I posted on my blog.  Life has a tendency to throw you the odd curve ball, and I had stuff to deal with that kept me away from Bonsai for a while.  Still worked on my trees, just did not get the time to post on here.

Anyway, all sorted now so hopefully I will be able to get back into the swing and keep the blogging a bit more regular.

After a nice summer, Autumn has arrived quickly and the maples have responded with their usual splendid autumn colour.

One week later after a few days of heavy wind the magic has gone.

Shohin Spring

My small trees are starting to look nice now, having had a spell of nice warm and sunny weather.

Japanese Maple, Chinese Elm, Fern Accent

European Larch

English Elm

Larch and Elm for size comparison

European Hornbeam

Blackthorn

Blackthorn for size comparison

Japanese Maple

Japanese Maple for Size comparison

Korean Hornbeam

Chinese Elm

Silver Birch

Chinese Elm Tanuki

Bumblebee rescue

My good deed for the day.

As most people know, Bumblebees are having a bit of a hard time here in the UK, so when I found this big one walking around on our patio, very lethargic and not able to fly, I thought I give it a bit of a helping hand.

I offered it a drop of honey on the end of a stick and it spent a good five minutes lapping it up.

You could actually see that after a few minutes it started to gain some strength

Shortly after it took off (a bit unsteady from the sugar rush) and headed straight for the cherry blossom on a nearby tree and started to feed and collect pollen.

Hopefully it is going to find a place to settle and produce loads more of these gorgeous creatures.

Spring is in the air

Wow! Not posted anything since Christmas!  I really must make a bit more of an effort.

Anyhow, The trees are showing signs of waking up from their winter dormancy, which means reptting time.

I made a start on some of my smaller shohin and mame trees that had protection in the cold greenhouse over the winter.  Too many to show individually, but here are a few group photos of today's effort.

Happy Christmas

Hope you all have a great Christmas.

Two more Display Tables

A bit more spare time this last weekend, so I thought I might bring a few more bits of wood to good use.

I am a bit o a hoarder when it comes to odd bits of wood, so from time to time I have to justify this habit by actually using some of it.

Hand Tools used:  Tenon saw, Fret saw, block plane, mitre block, mitre square, sandpaper, rasp

Power tools used: Drill, Palm sander, Plunge router, Dremel with sanding wheel

No screws or nails, all joints are glued with either dowelled or mortice and tenon joints.

So, here is pile No.1, a bit of plywood and a few odd offcuts

This was used to make this little lacquered display table.  It needs the initial lacquer coat sanding and then 2 more coats of Lacquer.

Pile No.2, offcuts of solid Oak Floorboards

This was turned into a two tier shohin display table