Chinese Quince

Repotted the Chinese Quince. It really needed it as it had been potted up in "black mud". The good thing is the roots came clean very easy and required minimal pruning. It likes moisture so I added a fair amount of Akadama to the coarse mix. The tree has a nice trunk, it fruited nicely last year, and the bark color and flecking is spectacular.

On the minus, the branches are not great, nebari stinks, and there is NO ramification. Ramification is what is on the plate this year, and trying to chase the branches back so they are not so lankey. The Tokoname pot from the Yamaki (sp?) is quite nice and I think works much better than the round one.

Japanese Maple

Unknown Cultivar of Japanese Maple. As you can see the Japanese pot had a little bit of a hard time over the winter and kind of exploded. I will use this pot now as a training pot to work on the roots of some young Japanese Beech that are being trained for a future forest planting. (Waste not, want not).
The new Sara Rayner pot is simply beautiful and the color is perfect, don't you think? Plus it is planted a little deeper to allow for better cultivation of the roots.
The branches are a mess! This tree has undergone a lot of hard times. It had a bad case of mealy-but infestation several years ago and I almost lost it. It figures that they would go crazy when I was away on vacation and had to treat it when I got back and most of the foliage was missing! It has been wee ever since and I have let it grow out to try and recover some strength. This year I cut the roots short, cut off long internodes and intend to fertilize and water well to increase vigor. In addition, the two trunks have become too similar in size and shape and the dominate trunk needs to be strengthened. I rotated it 180 deg. Which front do you like?