A fairly young but very vigorous Willow had been planted within 5 metres of my kitchen wall. In between there was a drain and a soakaway but I had my fears that it was too invasive a species to allow to grow. So regretfully I took it down. It was around 20' tall so it provided me with an opportunity to experiment with tons of material. I'm completely seduced by the quality, beauty and technique displayed in Simon Temblett's fantastic Willow which recently won best in show at The Swindon Bonsai show.
So here we go with the first instalment of another long term project
First I brought it down limb by limb:
Thank god for the shredder! (She'd kill me if she knew I called her that)
Dumped the useable stuff in buckets. They root straight out with no help whatsoever, up to arm thickness....
One of the smaller pieces of limb straight after felling
Another
I left them in buckets for various lengths of time. I was a little concerned as it was autumn but the cold could come in very quickly and freeze any new roots if left in water so I kept an eye on the weather reports and left them in there until the roots really started.
There are two trunks which I put straight in the ground which have a fabulous base and are really chunky. I'll have roots coming out around 6" above this flare initially, but I am advised that I can gradually start to remove these by raising the heights on repot.
I read online that these would strike just by sticking them straight in the ground. So I opted to cut one down to the length that I would use for the final image, and the other I experimented with leaving at twice the height.
The tallest is around 4' tall. Unfortunately I didn't snap any pics as I planted them, but rest assured that although they seem to lack taper, the 9" or so below ground spreads beautifully with a nice flare.
22" tall with big flared base below soil line - 4" thick trunk / 7" at base. Note the bark is already switching from more juvenile to Mature
48" Tall (a whopper) from side - this may eventually be cut down to around 1/3rd height unless it buds in a pleasing or unexpected way (I quite like the idea of having a 6' - 7' weeping willow in a pot)
My reasoning here was that I'd try a number of different techniques to achieve the same thing. I intend to reduce the height of the big one after a couple of years in the ground, to where the idea buds are, and the shorter grounded one I will carve out a full length shari once I choose which buds will form new leaders
This weekend I pulled the remaining 8 from the buckets, chose the healthiest looking 3 and binned the rest. (I need to keep space for an upcoming dig). I've promised the pick of the potted ones to a local bonsai buddy
I planted them in 60% molar clay, 20% grit and 20% John Innes. To assess results, I made one a slightly more organic mix and reduced the molar clay, and one a more molar clay based mix and reduced the organic matter.
I planted them in pond baskets which I found online for around £2.20 each for the largest (28cm x 28cm) and then I lined with weed retarding sheet (£8 for about 12 m x 5m) to keep the substrate from escaping. Tis good stuff...
Due to their height they were very unstable in the baskets so I ran cable ties from corner to corner of the baskets around the trunk, then made an adjustable tensioner out of 2mm wire looped around both sides of the tie... just slide towards the trunk until taut. This way I can adjust the tension at will. They are rock steady in here.
Next up I wanted to give some frost protection to the bigboys in the ground. I will mulch the bases up come frost time but have some concerns about the new growth and also the apparent tendency of the exposed heartwood to easily rot in the rains. I'm also reliably informed that they will develop faster with protection of sorts. So I created some in-situ greenhouses with thick Polyurethane sheeting made into a hat, which I gaffer taped at the base.
It's not going to win any awards for aesthetics but I think these will do a nice job.
Probably the most promising of the trees in baskets based on how they would look in nature. All of the branches will probably need reducing in length once adventitious buds have swelled and burst
Within as little as 5 years the bark on all of these should be that wonderful Ryvita-esque craggy brown with fissues and the like, which will make a huge difference to how they look as a trunk. For now they will just try and get healthy
Finally, here's one I took as a cutting about 5 weeks before I felled the tree. It's a truly wimpy looking thing but I am going to be experimenting on this with a number of advanced techniques before I let loose on the material with real potential. In hindsight it would have given them all a better chance to have taken them in late summer.... but I only had one Willow in the garden !
I have plenty of plans to deal with taper (or apparent lack thereof) but I won't divulge that now, let's just see how many get through winter in their new homes. As it stands they are just bits of wood with shoots. There are ugly knobs and branch removal wounds which will all need attention but for now I will cross my fingers for the winter and hope we get to see them begin to really flourish in the spring next year.
If you have any experience with Salix or would like to ask any questions/ proffer any tips I'd be delighted to hear from you in the comments.
As always, thanks for reading
DJ
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