Bonsai Mums: A Guide

Discussion in 'Advanced Growing Techniques' started by nugglord_420, Nov 9, 2008.

  1. I think I'm going to give this a try
     
  2. Hello

    My question is about topdressing bonsai mums. My little friend, is over a year old and healthy. Stalk right around 3/4 inch in a one gallon pot. I topdress every month or so with a dusting (1/16") of store bought earth worm casing mixed 70/30 or so with an an aged, peat based, store bought, organic potting soil.

    How much topdressing is too much? Do you guys ever remove topdressing after a period of time? and by observing the bark of this gal, she wants to root with any dark moist medium :) I don't want to over do it, but will stem bark change over to root system...?

    If anyone can answer one of these many questions i'd be pretty happy lol.. Thank you.
     
  3. epic postage. subb3d*

    d;
     
  4. #105 cRACKm0NKEY, Mar 6, 2013
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 6, 2013
    Inspired by this thread, I'm attempting this bonsai mom technique. Seems to be going fine, except for when I go out of town for a few days. The soil for my bonsai is mostly earthworm castings. I thought it would be muddy and retain enough water to make it through a weekend, but I seem to have to water it every 1.5 days. It was droopy when I got back from a weekend trip. All my other plants only need water every 3 or 4 days.

    Any advice on how to keep this thing retaining enough water so that I can just water all my plants on the same day? Or at least a temporary solution that would make it through the occasional weekend trip?

    Thanks!
     

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  5. im not too experienced with growing (currently growing first test plant ((indoor)) before i do my full grow in april) and im not sure if i understood correctly, but did you start it with a clipped branch from another plant? you said "rooted cutting".
    if this is what you meant, could i start it from a seed?

    im thinking not because it would start very small and be killed by the clippings.
     
  6. Smart pot sip...link's in my sig ;)

    Sent from my iPad using GC Forum
     
  7. Thanks noob! You're the man! (of the wo variety)

    Those are some really good ideas that I've never really seen before. I was thinking of a mini-SIP, but it looks like I can just sit it on a dish of water and perlite for the same effect and way less work.

    I'm probably going to put a bunch more holes in the bottom of my square bonsai mom container, then just set it on a small tray with water and plenty of perlite. Looks like it would be better with smartpot material, but I really like square pots for bonsai so that root pruning is easier. Maybe if I can replace just the bottom of the pot with smartpot material (is it just wool?) I'd have the best of both.
     
  8. Works perfectly well with the hard pots, I just like the smarties. Just make sure to push it down into the perlite a bit so there's contact between the soil and perlite and you're good to go. :)

    Sent from my iPad using GC Forum
     
  9. Thanks for this great post!
     
  10. Sub zero wins...
     
  11. Great post! Thanks for sharing,
     
  12. Hello everybody,
    I want to give this a try. I am a bit of a noob when it come to growing so please don't get too upset if I ask weird question.
    He states as follows:
     
    "Lets start with Mumming up a plant from a rooted cutting, once again this is simple. You will find that with every batch of cuttings a few will stand out, being sturdier and generally looking better all round, pick one or two of these to make your Mums, not some wimpy left over reject. Remember this mum will provide you with cuttings 4 to 18 times a year for the next 3 to 15 years, so only the best will do. Pick a fully rooted through cutting from the plug tray and pot on into a 2.5 inch square pot. I find square pots much easier to deal with when it comes to root pruning, as you will see later."
     
    A mum a full decent branch? If I don't have a mum and want to start directly from a seed?
     
  13. #114 joe 60, Oct 9, 2013
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 9, 2013
    imo there only one way to get a good mother plant
     
    grow out a pack of 10 seeds or more, select the best plants (heathy, fast growing and short and bushy) take 3 cutting from each of the best plants, tag the plant and cutting so you know what plant the cutting were taking from, flower the plants off,
     
    when the cutting root re pot them and keep them in veg
     
    when you havest the plant keep them tagged so you know what bud came from what plant and the total yield from each plant
    also you will know how long eack plant needs in flower and how long it takes the cutting to root and how many rooted
     
    when you have picked the plant you want to keep as a mother take 10 cutting and flower all the plants you want in veg
    when the cutting root, tag the best 3 plants and do a 4 way lst, as the top shoots get to 3-4" HIgh, remove the fan leaves attached to to the node and when you take cutting alway cut just above the first node
     
    keep the best plant as the mother plant and keep removing the fan leaves to give you more clones
     
     
    mother plant.png
     
    this set up can give you 80 cutting a mouth off a 2ft wide plant vegged under a 150w blue cfl
     
  14. Hey Great. Thanks for the response. I wanted to buy some seeds, all females, in order to have something to work with. What indoor strain should I go with? Something that I can keep small in order to go for the bonsai.
     
     
    I'm sorry what do you mean by "flower the plants off"? 
     
  15.  "flower the plants off"?   turn the plants over to a 12/12 light cycle (flower)
     
    you can keep any strain small, use low powered light, t5 tubes are good, keep the plant in a 2lt pot, this will slow the plant down and take cutting every 2 weeks if you need to or not as this will stop the plant getting any bigger, only give the plant nutes once a week (1/2 strenth) to keep her heathy but stops her growing much, give her an extra feed 3-4 days before you take cutting
     
    after a 2-3 mouths the fan leaves will start to go yellow and the plants heath will go down hill
    take the plant out the plant pot and cut 3" off the bottom and sides of the root ball  and use some fresh soil in the pot, the plant will look green and heathy in about a week
     
    there loads of good strains out there that will work,
     
  16. Regarding renovation, how much of a mum can be chopped off? If one is growing a bit unwieldy, and in a larger pot, is it possible to trim it down to a few inches high and root prune to transplant to a smaller pot? Should the above-ground vegetation be trimmed first and allowed to overcome shock before root-pruning to transplant to a smaller pot? Thanks for any advice.
     
  17. you can cut the plant down to a few inches high and trim the root, thats what a lot of growers do when the reveg a plant
     
    just make sure there are at least one heathy fan leave left at the end of each side/top shoot after you cut it down or that part of the plant will die
     
  18. Excellent, thanks for the info.
     
  19. how long do I have to wait to be able to take 2 cuttings from a mother plant?, one in which was just started from seed.
     

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