Larch #6

I bought this tree a couple weeks ago at the Kromeriz exhibition because I wanted a tree that could become an interesting looking literati for a relatively low yamadori price. Also, just to challenge myself and see what I could come up with from more or less boring or very average material. Again, I would like to hopefully motivate people that decent trees can be created from material that will keep your wallet happy.

Here is the tree as bought.

The nebari is actually not too bad once I’ll be able to cut back the long root that moves all the way to the end of the training pot. However, since it is planted not completely center and this long root was left, it may take a couple re-poting sessions (maybe 4 years) to get the root mass back to the trunk.

The following day, I jumped on this tree and styled it as well as created some deadwood and treated it with dyed lime-sulfur.

While I was wiring the crown I took a step back and realized that I probably won’t ever like this design and that actually a very compact literati could be made. Perhaps I made a mistake in making the deadwood and not incorporating the removal of the lower branches into the design. I made a photo edit showing my future vision of what this tree could be and I might actually bring this design into reality fairly soon.

Maybe I’ll do it in the spring, but the first step is having a look at the rootball at that time and deciding what to do from there.

Ciao,

Tom