A Detailed Guide to the Latest Cultivation Methods for Maple Bonsai

Maple is a famous landscape tree, with a graceful and charming form, making it an excellent material for bonsai. In making a maple bonsai, besides the processing methods, what matters more is the choice of tree form and its original natural shape, and it takes a certain amount of time to shape it. Every maple bonsai should have its own characteristics. Now let us take a look at the cultivation methods for maple bonsai!

Shaping the Tree Form of Maple Bonsai

Wild maples are plentiful. For making bonsai, old stumps or young trees are mostly dug up from the mountains and wilds. The new branches are relatively long and soft, and can be trained by wiring into many styles of bonsai. Common ones include the formal upright style, informal upright style, curved trunk style, twin trunk style, cascade style and forest style. Shaping is mainly by pruning, with wiring as a supplement. The leaves are relatively large, so it is not suitable to make them into cloud-pad or cloud-cluster shapes; instead, the branches and leaves are often pruned into a natural style with coordinated heights and proper density. After frost, the maple leaves turn red, dazzling and delightful.

Planting and Pot Selection for Maple Bonsai

1. Planting: Maple is best planted in February to March, before spring budding. Before planting, the branches and roots should be pruned once, and at the same time half of the old soil should be removed and replaced with new soil, and decomposed bean cake should be applied at the bottom of the pot as a base fertilizer. Maple likes loose, fertile and moist soil, and grows poorly in barren land. For planting maple, 2/3 humus soil mixed with 1/3 sandy soil can be used.

2. Pot selection: The leaves of most maples turn from green to red after frost in late autumn, so when choosing a pot, be careful not to use purple clay pots or glazed ceramic pots in red or green. For forest-style maple bonsai, a shallow pot of white marble or marble can be used, and the pot soil can be worked into an uneven natural mountain-and-wild shape. If a few pieces of turtle-vein stone or Yingde stone are placed at suitable spots on the pot surface, dotted with a few small figurines of people or animals, the bonsai will have a stronger feel of life.

Care and Management of Maple Bonsai

1. Location: Maple likes a shady and cool environment and avoids direct strong sunlight, so the bonsai should be kept under a shade shed or under other trees. If placed in strong light or on a balcony, leaf scorch often occurs. Because indoor ventilation is poor, a maple bonsai should not be kept indoors for more than one week, otherwise it is unfavorable for growth. In winter in the north, the maple bonsai should be moved into a low-temperature indoor room; in the south, it is enough to bury the pot in wind-sheltered, sun-facing soil for it to overwinter safely.

2. Watering: Maple leaves are large and evaporate water quickly. During the growing season, water frequently; in hot weather, sprinkle water on the ground often to keep the microclimate moist. In winter, maple enters dormancy and should be watered less; as long as the pot soil is moist, it can be left unwatered.

3. Fertilizing: Before spring budding and when the leaves unfold, apply one dilute decomposed organic liquid fertilizer each time, but do not fertilize on rainy days. In August to September, apply one dilute decomposed liquid fertilizer each time; do not fertilize during winter dormancy.

4. Shaping: Maple has strong sprouting ability and often sends out new buds on the trunk. Any buds not needed for the design and any overly dense branches should be cut off in time. This not only saves nutrients but also helps ventilation and light penetration. The best viewing period for maple is when the new leaves have just unfolded. If all the leaves are removed in late summer and one dilute decomposed liquid fertilizer is applied, new leaves will grow in about 20 days, thus adding another best viewing period.

5. Disease prevention: Common diseases of maple include brown spot disease and powdery mildew. When disease occurs, spray with a 800 to 1000 times dilution of 50% carbendazim wettable powder, once every 10 to 15 days, for 2 to 3 consecutive sprays. The main pests are the yellow-spined caterpillar and the glossy-shouldered longhorn beetle. For the yellow-spined caterpillar, control generally involves digging up pupae in late autumn to early spring while plowing the soil and destroying them in a concentrated way, or spraying a 1000 times dilution of 50% fenitrothion emulsion in the early stage of larval occurrence. For the glossy-shouldered longhorn beetle, for eggs and larvae that have not yet bored into the xylem, a 150 times dilution of 50% fenitrothion emulsifiable concentrate can be sprayed on the larvae on the trunk; for severely affected young trees, cut them down at the base and burn them in a concentrated way, or inject a 100 to 200 times dilution of 40% dimethoate emulsifiable concentrate into the bore holes and then seal the holes with mud, which gives a relatively good effect.