06/11/2026
Yee haw y'all, come one come all and join me and for a workshop I'm calling "Taning Wild Deciduous", focused on our native elms and maples from local cow pasture as I mentioned in another recent post. This workshop is for all levels of bonsai artists who want to learn fundamental principles for deciduous tree design. The skills in wiring, branch selection, and pruning will transfer to many other native and japanese species, but there are some nuances for native species and their own challenges.
Why grow native species for bonsai?
1. Native species from your immediate climate tend to be more resilient for our local conditions, temperatures, and have coevolved with the local pests barring some newer invasive one throwing thing s out of balance. In that way, they are often easier to care for and less likely to need fungicide or pesticide except perhaps for cosmetic reasons/mild infections. Many in my garden have not needed any to survive and thrive in the last 6 years in Ohio.
2. Another reason to grow native is that it supports the native ecosystems (bugs and birds in particular). A single native small bonsai may not seem like it will have much impact in this regard, but scale this up to many bonsai gardens in the country and especially to commercial production and our periods of training trees in the ground where they really grow unchecked while building the trunk and this provides a lot more environmental benefit than doing the same with nonnative species.
3. Growing native species is what we need to do to observe and propagate varieties of interest. Just as the Japanese maple and azaleas were cultivated for centuries and now have 1000s of named varieties, one day, you may find an interesting mutation in a seed or branch of your American elm or Red maple.
What other reasons can you think of? Maybe one day, I will expand on this as a whole blog post. I had more info than the caption would fit!
