DID YOU KNOW?
By Tom ReganThat the bark of a tree has three very important and practical functions: It is waterproof, so it prevents leaking from the phloem; It also houses small structures, called lenticels, that allow the tree to breathe; and the bark's third function is to protect the phloem from all kinds of impacts, abrasions and attacks from pests; including: insects and fungi.
That wounds on bonsai trees do not heal in the same manner as the wounds of humans and/or animals. That is to say, trees are not able to repair damaged tissue; instead they continue to manufacture a new layer of cells with each years growth, until the wounds is entirely covered over. The length of time this 'healing' process takes depends upon the size of the wound and the overall size of each new annual growth ring.
That if you look at a cross-section of a tree trunk you will see rings and each of these rings indicates a full years worth of life and growth. Scientists can tell by the thickness or thinness of a ring in which year more rain and more subsequent growth took place. Accordingly, a thick ring indicates a year with more rain and more growth and thin ring indicates a year with less rain and less growth. This analysis is one method that curators of arboretums can use to tell when an injury occurred to an imported bonsai that is of an unknown age and approximately how many years it took for that injury to 'heal' or be completely calloused over. Scientific researchers and meteorologists can also use this method in their study of weather patterns from hundreds of years ago.
That mature trees, both bonsai and those on the front lawn, develop what is known as a 'collar' around the base of the largest branches. This swelling takes years to develop and is caused by the up and down, forward and backward, motion of the largest and heaviest branches as they are pushed to and fro by the whims of Mother Nature. These collars are important to those of us practicing bonsai cultivation, because they help to quicken the bonsai's healing processes by enabling wounds - specifically those wounds that are left after the pruning of large branches - to heal more rapidly.
DID YOU KNOW?
That the oldest bonsai in the national collection is over 300 years old. The bonsai is a White Pine that is affectionately known as the Yamaki Pine, in honor of its donor, Masaru Yamaki. The Yamaki began its life in the 1600s and, despite being less than five miles away from the impact site, it survived the atomic bomb blast at Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.
That several of the bonsai in the national collection were given as gifts to various Presidents of the United States. In fact, in 1998, the Japanese Prime Minister, Mr. Obuchi, gave President William Jefferson Clinton an 80-year-old Ezo Spruce. The gift was truly significant to the national bonsai collection for two reasons: the first and most obvious reason is the fact that it is a masterpiece and the second, and lesser-known reason, is that the gift of an Ezo Spruce - any Ezo Spruce - to an American president is significant, because the United States maintains a long standing ban on the importation of all Ezo Spruce and, as a result, the national collection has been without an Ezo Spruce specimen.
That for many species of deciduous bonsai trees the size of the leaf is directly related to the type and amount of sunlight the tree is cultivated in. A bonsai that is grown in partial shade or in full shade will have longer and larger leaves, because the tree is trying to maximize the amount of sunlight it can absorb to enable it to continue its photosynthetic processes - a larger leaf has more surface area with which to gather sunlight. In contrast, a bonsai tree that is grown in direct sun, all or most of the time, will have smaller and more compact leaves, because it is receiving all of the sunlight it needs. As a result, it can devote its energy to growing. This is important for all trees, but more important for trees cultivated for bonsai, as smaller leaves are proportionate to the smaller scale of a bonsai tree; smaller leaves are, therefore, a positive trait, both aesthetically and from a horticultural perspective, because a tree is healthiest when it has access to all of the energy it needs to develop.
That an evergreen tree, such as a pine (black, white, red, scots pine, etc.) does not keep its needles for-ever. In fact, while evergreen trees do not shed their needles in a blaze of autumn splendor, along with the deciduous trees, every fall, they do replace their needles in two or three year cycles. Accordingly, evergreen trees remain for the most part, always green, because younger needles remain on the branch, as more mature needles are replaced.
YOUR BONSAI CAN OUTLIVE YOU - THEORETICALLY
Can A Bonsai Tree Live Forever? Trees, in general, can and will outlive all of us - many times over. The giant redwood trees, indigenous to the West Coast of the United States, are some of the oldest living creatures on the planet. It is understandably difficult for some people to equate or associate a 200 ft. tall redwood tree with a 12 in. tall bonsai tree, but nevertheless they are both trees. In the case of bonsai trees, the simple fact that they are "trees" genetically, and "bonsai" trees by way of human intervention, gives them the innate capability, under favorable circumstances, to live for several centuries - at least and forever - theoretically.
Of course, there are scores of circumstances and variables, some controllable and many others not, that all have the potential to enable or to prevent a tree, be it a bonsai or not, from living for very long.
A tree in nature and growing under what we will assume are "perfect" conditions, will grow until it reaches the natural predetermined height for that species. Once this height has been realized, the tree commences its natural habit of growing or, to put it another way, spreading sideways, enabling the tree to support as much foliage as possible. After centuries of this continued growth pattern, what happens is that the distance between the active and effective roots at the edge of the trees root system and the now massive amount of foliage at the incalculable number of branch tips is just too vast. As a result of this natural process, the tree starts to weaken and will eventually die. Why? Because the foliage has grown too far away from the active roots - its leaves are now receiving inadequate amounts of life giving water and nutrients and, in turn, the leaves are unable to supply sufficient sugars to the root system. In due course, this course being centuries long, the heartwood will rot and the tree will collapse.
How Can A Bonsai Live Forever? The main difference between a bonsai tree and a tree growing naturally in the wild, as mentioned above, is human intervention. A tree in nature, growing in perfect conditions, will grow until it reaches the maximum dimensions for that species, with consideration given to the specific environmental conditions that it is exposed to, and inevitably it will die. Conversely, a bonsai tree, which it is not a "species" of tree, but rather a traditional set of techniques and styles for growing and caring for a tree - almost any kind of tree can be trained as a "bonsai" tree - is prevented from ever reaching its maximum dimensions through regularly pruning of both the root system and branch structure. A non-bonsai example of this pruning technique extending the life of a tree is that of trees that are grown as hedge. Hedges live much longer than their full-size counterparts growing in their natural habitat, because they are never allowed to reach their maximum dimensions. My Aunt Agnes still lives in the home that her father built and the hedges that separate their property lines were planted by her grandfather before the war - World War Two! While the practice of trimming hedges is not exactly like the practices of branch and root pruning in a traditional bonsai sense, it is a good "Western" gardening style example of how the life of a tree can be extended through regular and careful human intervention.
So, Then, How Does One Keep A Bonsai Alive Forever? Trees that are being: grown, nurtured, trained, and developed using traditional bonsai techniques have the very real potential of living forever. The reason this potential exists is because a bonsai grown by a professional (and so must yours for the same incredible results to be possible) is cared for very precisely and very meticulously. On a daily basis the every need of the bonsai are met, starting with the essentials of proper watering and sunlight exposure.
