Comparing the yamadori that others dig up, mine can only be called stump-grubbing. I'm so envious.

I've noticed a characteristic: many famous bonsai masters in Europe and America have the habit of going up into the mountains to dig yamadori themselves. Later I read their blogs and analyzed it, and there may be the following reasons:

1. In their area, unlike in our Celestial Empire, there are hordes of yamadori diggers. As long as there are trees locally, someone will dig yamadori and then hawk them on Tieba, WeChat Moments and other places, while very few of them do this work, so they can only do it themselves.

2. Going up into the mountains to dig yamadori is a goal in itself, and it also serves as hiking and fitness.

3. Searching for yamadori in the mountains helps them understand the native environment and the seasonal changes of the tree species, so as to better understand the habits of these species.

4. In the mountains they can take many interesting photos, which helps them find inspiration.

5. They only take ones they find acceptable. If you have someone else dig yamadori and the trunk shape is poor, do you accept it or not?

Based on these reasons, judging from the yamadori collections of several famous masters that I posted before, their yamadori quality is indeed very high. Because they would rather come back empty-handed than force themselves to dig up a tree. This set of pictures shows yamadori collected by a famous Italian bonsai master. They are all pines. The first few may be Japanese red pine (Pinus densiflora), and the last one is larch (Larix). They call this kind of stump the yamadori type, and even now I still haven't thought of a suitable Chinese term to match it.