a bonsai begins...

as i mentioned a couple days ago, we had to make a swift exit from the garden center before we ended up purchasing more plants than we had space to accommodate. the urge to spend money was especially strong in the bonsai section. sadly, the obsession did not end with our exit.

it should be noted that i am somewhat overconfident when it comes to the subject of growing all sorts of stuff. i can grow most of the tropical things that show up in people's homes as houseplants, and i welcome the challenge of growing all sorts of edible things.

i do, however, have two weaknesses where plants are concerned: i have never met an orchid that i did not kill, and i am genuinely afraid of being left alone with a bonsai, because it too will likely die. i skipped right past the display of orchids at the garden center, but i was absolutely smitten by all things bonsai.

naturally, it would not be enough to just buy one of the things and try to keep it alive. no. i decided that i wanted to start from scratch. luckily, we live in a place with lots of tree varieties that would be perfect for this sort of absurdity.

i was waxing poetically about all of the local trees i could use, when he turned and pointed at the massive old maple on the other side of the wall of glass. we are always having to weed mini-maples out of the balcony garden plants, which means that the thing i was looking for was literally right outside my door.

skip forward to the next day (a few-several hours ago, to be precise), when he stepped in from the balcony and handed me what i thought at first was a weed he probably wanted me to identify.

him: here is your future bonsai.

the main challenge with growing a tree while trying to keep it relatively tiny is to limit the amount of space in which the roots have to grow. i repurposed a little four-inch pot that housed one of the many transplants we purchased for a series of planting projects (which i will talk about at some point in the near future).

add one mini-maple, and... TA DA!!! a bonsai begins.

then i watered it and added it to a tray that contains a few other tiny plants, including a chunk of moss that was locally sourced... which is a polite way of saying that i scraped off a chunk of moss from the walkway alongside a local canal. it too will end up in a future project... if it survives that long.

and they are living for now on my highly-untidy workspace, next to a box of other assorted mini-plants. everything is mini it seems.