Jason Sidabras

I’ve tried my hand at bonsai growing a few times with little success. Each plant has met its demise by one of three ways:

• Lack of water
• Lack of sunlight
• Too close to a window in winter

This time will be different. I am determined to have a bonsai collection that I can pass down to either my children or some New York Art garden to maintain my collection. It all starts with a seed.

So I seed I got. I chose to go with Japanese Green Maple (Acer palmatum) from BonsaiBoy. Mainly because it fits well with the bonsai idea that I’ve had. Most of the people who know me, know that I am not a spiritual person.  But sometimes I enjoy the beauty in nature and simplicity… even if I don’t live by them.

With that being said, the bonsai idea that I’ve wanted to accomplish and nurture is a Single Root Group.

The idea behind it - and obviously with thousands of years of bonsai growing not an original one - is to grow a single tree to the height of the width of the container. Training the tree would be in a style with some trunk shape and all the leaves growing from one side. Then when the branches are strong enough and in good positions you re-root the plant by placing the entire trunk into the dirt! This give a very Tao like feel where all of the forest is from one root.

I like it.

So I’ve created a new Bonsai category to log my adventures and mishaps. The first is getting these Japanese Maple seeds to grow, which looks like I need to complete these steps:

1. Soak in hot tap water (120 degrees F) and let stand in water for 2 days
2. Combine 1 tablespoon of moist peat moss in polybag
3. Keep warm (70 degrees F) for 120 days!
4. Keep cold for 120 days!
5. Sow seeds 3/8″ deep

Eesh. Needless to say half the seeds will go through the 120+120 day process. Others will go through a speedier method.

Wait… isn’t bonsai supposed to teach me patience?

I think I’ve failed already.

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