Conejo Valley Bonsai Society. Conejo Valley Bonsai Society. Election of 2014 Officers. President s Message Holiday Potluck Is Coming!

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1 Conejo Valley Bonsai Society A member of the Golden State Bonsai Federation Graphic by Paul Centeno Conejo Valley Bonsai Society In This Issue President s Message: Holiday Potluck Is Coming! 1 Election of 2014 Officers 1 CVBS Programs: The 2013 Schedule 2 Barrett s Bonsai Tips: Still Time To Work on Black Pine 3 Refreshments 3 CVBS Membership 3 Club Event: Pressler Continues Work on Twin-Trunk Boxwood 4 Coming Events 6 CVBS Niche Displays 6 V O L U M E 1 0 N U M B E R 1 1 N O V E M B E R President s Message Holiday Potluck Is Coming! By Marj Branson ur October meeting with our demonstrator, Bob Pressler, O was a fun evening. Bob was working on the ongoing boxwood project and it is really coming along very well. The end of October/early November saw the Golden State Bonsai Federation Convention in Burbank. I would like to thank all our members who helped out as volunteers. It was a great weekend for all who attended. The workshops had beautiful trees. I am sure all who signed up ended up with some great bonsai trees. The exhibition was excellent, with both large and small trees. And for the stone lovers there was the suiseki exhibition, which included a section of rare chrysanthemum stones. We all went through the vendor section many times looking for treasures. There was a good selection of tools, pots and trees. The GSBF President Marj Branson convention for 2014 will be held in Sacramento at the end of October/early November. The California Shohin Society has its convention coming up in 2014 in Santa Nella. This exhibition is every two years and this year it is January 31 February 2. It will have workshops, (Continued on page 3) CVBS on the Web (Click on name to visit Web site.) Conejo Valley Bonsai Society CVBS CaféPress Store CVBS Online Bonsai Gallery Other Bonsai Groups (Click on name to visit Web site.) Golden State Bonsai Federation American Bonsai Society Bonsai Club of Santa Barbara California Aiseki Kai Descanso Bonsai Society Dai Ichi Bonsai Kai Shohin Bonsai Society of So. Cal. Sansui-Kai of So. Cal. Santa Anita Bonsai Society South Coast Bonsai Association San Diego Bonsai Club Election of 2014 Officers ur November meeting will include the election of Conejo Valley Bonsai Society officers for The election will take place during the business meeting. We are as- O sembling a slate of candidates, but at press time it was a work in progress because we have not yet identified a candidate for the currently vacant vice president spot. The other three nominees are Marj Branson for president; Ken Fuentes for treasurer; and Ken Martin for secretary. All three are incumbents and all have agreed to stand for reelection. Members will have an opportunity to nominate other candidates or to volunteer to stand for election themselves during the meeting. Then members will immediately vote. The new officers will take office upon the close of the business meeting. The new officers can then appoint the various committee chairs (Membership, Newsletter, Refreshments, Librarian, Program, Publicity, Field Trips and Activities, and Webmaster chairs). New committee chairs will take office immediately. Please let me or our current president, Marj Branson, know if you are interested in becoming a CVBS officer before our November meeting begins or be prepared to make a nomination from the floor. Nominations Chair 2013 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY Views expressed by authors are not necessarily those of the Conejo Valley Bonsai Society

2 Contact Us (Click on ) Officers PRESIDENT Marj Branson Phone (805) Marj VICE PRESIDENT Vacant TREASURER Ken Fuentes Phone (805) Ken SECRETARY Ken Martin Phone (805) Ken ADVISOR Ken Fuentes Phone (805) Ken Committees MEMBERSHIP CHAIR Phone: (805) Larry NEWSLETTER EDITOR David E. Whiteside Phone (805) David PROGRAM CHAIR Al Espinoza Phone (818) Al PUBLICITY CO-CHAIRS Guy & Deborah Ervin Phone (805) Guy & Deborah REFRESHMENTS CHAIR Jill Peters Phone: (805) Jill LIBRARIAN Phone: (805) Larry Field Trips & Activities Rick Naber WEBMASTER Tom McGuire Tom Conejo Valley Bonsai Society Meetings Westlake Village City Hall Community Room Oakcrest Drive Westlake Village, CA :30 PM 9:00 PM 3 RD Thursday of every month CVBS Programs CVBS Programs January February March March April April May June July August September October October November November December NOTE: NEW 19 DATE December Bonsai Basics If you classes are interested and workshops in the CVBS are Mentoring open to every Program, member please at all see levels Larry of Kimmelman experience. They are designed to be introductory for for more newcomers information and & refreshers applications for to more participate. experienced bonsai hobbyists. 7:30 6:00 PM: PM Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Class: followed Bonsai by History & Styles DEMONSTRATION: ALEX MARTINEZ / Juniper DEMONSTRATION: ROY NAGATOSHI / Grafting 7:30 6:00 PM: PM Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Workshop followed by 7:30 6:00 PM: Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Class: followed Basics by of Design DEMONSTRATION: 7:30 PM Brief Meeting Bob Pressler followed by / Boxwood. First of a series DEMONSTRATION: from raw material Ted Matson to finished / Repotting bonsai. Boxwood 7:30 6:00 PM: Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Workshop followed by Workshop BRING 7:30 PM Brief Meeting YOUR followed TREES by 7:30 6:00 PM: Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Class: followed Shaping by with Wire DEMONSTRATION: 7:30 PM Brief Meeting Kathy followed Benson by / Olive critique. Members DEMONSTRATION: bring one Kathy olive Benson tree each / for Crapemyrtle Kathy s review. 6:00 PM Bonsai Basics Workshop 6:00 PM Bonsai Basics Workshop DEMONSTRATION: Ken Fuentes / Ficus nerifolia 6:00 PM Bonsai Basics Class: Soils & Fertilizers Workshop BRING TREES YOU PLAN TO EXHIBIT DEMONSTRATION: CESAREO PEREZ / Bonsai Displays 6:00 PM 9:30 PM: Workshop to Prepare Trees for Exhibition DEMONSTRATION: Jim Barrett / Critique for Show (Maximum 3 trees per person) BRING TREES YOU PLAN TO EXHIBIT BRING THE TREES YOU PLAN TO EXHIBIT 10TH 8TH ANNUAL EXHIBITION Gardens of the World 7:30PM 6:00 PM : Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Class: followed Potting by & Repotting DEMONSTRATION: 7:30 PM Brief Meeting Bob Pressler followed by / Boxwood. Second of a DEMONSTRATION: series from raw material Jim Barrett to finished /Proper bonsai. Pot Selection 7:30PM 6:00 PM : Bonsai Brief Meeting Basics Workshop followed by DEMONSTRATION: 7:30 PM Brief Meeting Ted Matson followed / by Shohin bonsai HOLIDAY HOLIDAY POTLUCK POTLUCK 7:30 PM 7:30 PM 2 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY NOVEMBER 2013

3 Barrett s Bonsai Tips Still Time To Work on Black Pines Refreshments We Are Covered! By Jim Barrett ou can still work with Japanese black pines if you Y missed doing it last month. Remove old, dried out needles and cut the long ones, leaving them about 1 inch to 1 ½ inches long. Remove or shorten all needles that hang down under the twigs and branches. Late summer and fall growth should be trimmed out, leaving one, two, or three new candles on each branch or terminal. How many you leave depends on your own goals for the tree. By removing or shortening the old growth, new buds will appear in January and February. Watch for wire damage on those trees that were wired earlier this year. No high-nitrogen fertilizers this month. Flowering and fruiting trees will benefit from an application of high phosphoric acid and potash fertilizer Super Phosphate is a good one. Aphids are still active at this writing and if the Jim Barrett weather stays warm enough, spider mites can still be a problem. Plants in general are not taking up water like they did earlier, so modify your watering schedule to suit your bonsai s needs. If pines and junipers start to turn light green instead of a healthy dark green, chances are they are receiving too much water. If your Japanese maple leaves are brown and dry, go ahead and remove them all, especially those that fall on the soil. Prune out unwanted twigs and branches. You may also want to apply a dormant spray even though this seems a little early. Re-potting (pot to pot) Japanese black pine and most junipers may be done at this time if the weather stays warm. Detail wiring is a tedious, boring job, but a necessary one. Any time from late November on through January is a good time for most deciduous trees. Drastic bending of main branches should be approached with caution due to the brittle nature of some deciduous trees, especially persimmon. Don t forget to choose your show trees [if you are planning to enter any in the Descanso Bonsai Society s June exhibition]. This is a good time to look for bonsai plant material, and don t forget Christmas is coming up. Give yourself a present. By Jill Peters hanks to last month s refreshment volunteers, Al Espinoza T and Nancy Smeets, for providing a veritable banquet for our meeting! It was appreciatively consumed. This month s volunteers are Fr. Tom Davis for cold drinks and Mike Mulhern for Eats/Sweets. I ll call to remind you beforehand. As the sign up list for December s Holiday Potluck will circulate this meeting, let s go through our recipe collections to decide what delicious dishes we will bring! Last year was an epicurean feast so I m sure we are all looking forward to a fabulous meal as well as all the raffle and auction excitement! 2013 Refreshments Cold Drinks Eats / Sweets President s Message continued from page 1 a shohin exhibition, and a large vendor section. Don t forget the Bonsai-A-Thon is coming up at the Huntington Gardens February 22 23, Our upcoming Holiday Potluck dinner will be Thursday, December 19th. Our potluck dinner is held in place of our normal meeting. In addition to our dinner, we will be having our auction and raffle. This is our annual fundraising event for the club, so come prepared. Be sure to sign up for what dish you will bring on the refreshments sheet Jill Peters will be circulating. Our November meeting will be a shohin bonsai demonstration with Ten Matson on November 21st. See you then. Nov. Dec. Fr. Tom Davis Mike Mulhern HOLIDAY POTLUCK CVBS Membership Come Join Us! By VBS extends a warm welcome to our newest member, Bob Pressler, owner of Kimura Bonsai and Landscape Nursery in C Northridge. Bob is a well known bonsai authority and a frequent CVBS demonstrator who has been involved in bonsai since the age of 10. Whether you are a visitor to our website, a reader of our newsletter, a guest at a monthly meeting, or have already decided to join our club, there are effectively no barriers to entry. Annual dues are $25 for one, $30 for couples. Our monthly meetings are held on the third Thursday of every month, starting at 7:30 PM, in the Westlake Village City Hall (located at Oakcrest Drive, Westlake Village, CA 91361). To join our club, please bring your check (made out payable to the Conejo Valley Bonsai Society) to our next monthly meeting, or mail it to:, CVBS Membership Chair, 2727 Autumn Ridge Drive, Thousand Oaks, CA NOVEMBER 2013 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY 3

4 Club Event Pressler Continues Work on Twin-Trunk Boxwood By Ken Martin or his demonstration at the Conejo Valley Bonsai Society s F October 2013 meeting, Kimura Bonsai and Landscape Nursery owner Bob Pressler brought the boxwood he had initially worked on at our March 2013 meeting. At that March meeting, Bob worked on the two-trunk, 26- inch tall boxwood, which was in a 15 gallon nursery can. The only thing that had been done to it prior to the March demonstration was some of the upper branches had been tied together at the nursery to make the top fuller. During the March meeting, Bob cut off half the root ball and pruned the roots further. He also cut out dead branches and shortened all others. This tree has also been repotted in a 10 gallon can. Bob s objective for the October demonstration was to establish the tree s major framework and structure. This tree will be styled in the manner of an oak. Bob said this tree had several challenges (read, defects). The main problem, in Bob s mind, was the long, straight, untapered leader of one trunk. He said he would reduce or get rid of this unwanted feature. In fact, Bob said that if he were doing this tree for himself, he d cut all branches back to the bare trunks and let the tree sprout new branches. If he did this, it would probably end up near shohin-sized (eight inches). He said you can do this cut back to bare trunks, removing all the foliage with boxwood. The first thing he did was to shorten many branches, especially near the top. He said shari (deadwood on the trunk) is okay on boxwoods. However, jins (dead branches) don t last well and don t look right. (Continued on page 5) Bob Pressler examines the boxwood at the beginning of his October demonstration (top left). One of the tree s challenges: crossed roots (left). Midway through the demo, much of the foliage has been removed (bottom left). Bob removed a lot of bulk to produce a better taper (below). 4 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY NOVEMBER 2013

5 (Continued from page 4) Boxwoods can live in a shallower pot than some other species because the roots are fibrous and tend to spread out rather than down. At this point in the demonstration, Bob made the decision to go for a smaller tree. The two long straight trunks were too much of a challenge. The two trunks were cut and a smaller branch was wired upward for the main apex. He plans to wire the still fairly long lower branches slightly down and the branches near the top are already slightly up. He carved material out of the crotch in one lower trunk so it wouldn t look so clunky. He decided where the front should be. The nebari (base where the roots flare outward) is fairly good from most angles so it was not a major factor. One main trunk will be slightly to the rear of the other. When trimming the tips of boxwoods, it s important to remember that the leaves come out of the twig in pairs. In most cases you want the two new shoots to be horizontal, so prune to two horizontal leaves. Bob took the tree back to his nursery where he will do some occasional pruning. He will take pictures for us when he does. The plan is for him to bring the tree back for a next demonstration in March or April 2014, at which time he will transplant it into a bonsai pot. Bob at first thought this tree had too many challenges to ever amount to much of a bonsai. After all the work he did at the October demo, he really likes the tree and its potential. Bob left part of one of he offending trunks as a jin (top right). The tree at the end of the demo (right). Library Our Club Library Includes Books and Three New DVDs We have three new DVDs for our Library. All three are from Boon Manakitivipart, and include (1) Styling & Maintenance Techniques for junipers, (II) Cutting, Pruning, Styling, Repotting and Wiring Japanese maples, and (III) Repotting Deciduous Trees. Still available is the DVD, The Growing Art of Bonsai by A. Skolnik (a bonsai artist and grower). It s great for beginners and intermediate skill levels. The video is just 58 minutes, but covers critical areas such as how to choose a tree, how to prune, wire and pot it, and how to keep it healthy. There are artistic teachings and workshops, including horticultural techniques, that are discussed by several bonsai growers. It won the approval of the late bonsai master John Naka who said, There are many bonsai video tapes, but I would say yours is the very best. Members are welcome to borrow club library materials for a month at a time, and we only ask that the borrowed materials be returned at the next club meeting. Please note we also have novice books that provide bonsai basics to help our newer members get off to a good start. NOVEMBER 2013 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY 5

6 Coming Events (click on the hyperlinks to visit Web sites or send s) December 2013 December 7, 2013 / Fresno, California Fresno Bonsai Society: 5th Annual Bonsai Yard Sale, 736 West Browning Avenue. Hours: 9 AM 2 PM. Pre-bonsai, bonsai, pots, accent plants, stones, books and all things bonsai. Anyone is welcome to buy or sell. Contact Ralph Schroeder for more information at ralsch@sbcglobal.net January / February January 31 February 2, 2014 / Santa Nella, California California Shohin Seminar at the Hotel Mission de Oro, Santa Nella California. Friday (Jan 31): Registration, Demonstrations, and Exhibit and Vendor areas Set Up. Everyone is invited to share their treasured Shohin Bonsai in the Exhibit Saturday (Feb 1): Exhibit Opens for Viewing, Vendor Sales Critiques, Workshops, Bazaar & Benefit Drawing. Sunday (Feb 2): Exhibit Open 10:30 Noon. Critique and Demonstration, Business Meeting Registration Forms available on the website on November 1st For general information calshohin@yahoo.com, website: or phone: Randi Keppeler February 22 & 23, 2014 / San Marino, California Bonsai-A-Thon XVIII at The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino; annual fundraiser for the GSBF Collection at The Huntington Botanical Gardens. Admission to the event is free with Bonsai-A-Thon early bird registration between 8 AM 9:30 AM. Event hours are 8 AM 4:30 PM both days. Sunday morning: bring-your-own-tree workshop led by Ted Matson limit 10 people (for details contact Ted, tmatson@earthlink.net). Pancake breakfast, tour hosted by Jim Folsom (Director of the Garden), demonstrations, lunch, bonsai exhibits, large sales area, raffle, and auction. For more information, contact Marge Blasingame, (626) margeblasingame@att.net. February 22 & 23, 2014 / Oakland, California GSBF Bonsai Garden at Lake Merritt: Mammoth Fundraiser 2014 at the Lakeside Garden Center, 666 Bellevue Avenue. Saturday (Feb 22): Auction of fabulous bonsai 1 PM 4 PM with preview at 12 Noon. Sunday (Feb 23): Mammoth Plant Sale and a huge gathering of Vendors, 9 AM 4 PM. Round Robin Demonstrations noon to 3 PM by Collection Curator, Kathy Shaner and Team. For general information website: or phone: Randi Keppeler April 26 27, 2014 / Palo Alto, California Kusamura Bonsai Club: 54th Annual Show. Location is Lucie Stern Community Center, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA Show hours are Saturday, Noon 5 PM and Sunday, 11 AM 5 PM. Demonstration each day at 1:00 PM, with special guest demonstrator Saturday. Club member sales available. For more information contact Mark O Brien at , mobrientrees@hotmail.com. Please see for more details. CVBS Niche Displays Our Niche Display Program n the Niche Program, club members I set up a mini exhibition display. Such a display consists of: The tree in a nice bonsai pot An accent plant A stand All these items are important to create the balance for a good display. We aspire to present the best display possible for everyone s pleasure and edification, so the niche is often assembled by one of the more experienced members. However, it is also our desire to give less experienced bonsai hobbyists an opportunity to learn by doing. So if any less experienced member feels his/her trees are not ready for a finished display, it is worthwhile to create a display that is a work-in-progress. It will be up to the club member to determine which category his/her display falls into, and then the work-in-progress display can become the talking point of work done, work intended, and suggestions from the floor. We encourage all members to sign up for the niche display! Please have a look at the calendar and let us know when you would like to present your display. Marj Branson Nov. Dec Niche Displays Yoko & Walter Zipush Holiday Potluck, No niche 6 CONEJO VALLEY BONSAI SOCIETY NOVEMBER 2013