Fieldcraft

Every tree that leaves my nursery is hard to let go. It should be.

Early on I talked to a grower whose approach was simple: he sells the ones he doesn't like anymore. That felt like saying the quiet part out loud. Here's why that bothers me. Why do we get so unreasonably excited when we bring home yet another tree? It's because we picture ourselves in the future enjoying what we have shaped that tree to become. I owe it to my customers to sell material that can actually get them there. I'm not going to sell you my trash and call it treasure.

So I had to learn the harder thing, which is selling the trees I'm proudest of. The other day I was going through my first-year Japanese maple seedlings, looking at the movement in them, and my first instinct was primal: Mine! Yeah... it doesn't get any easier. But that feeling is how I know a tree is off to the right start.

Still, a promising trunk line isn't enough. The tree also has to be ready. A seedling shouldn't be adopted until it has been through a winter and come back in spring with vigor. A collected tree spends its first year convalescing, not absorbing the trauma of shipping on top of it. Anything repotted stays here until the new roots are carrying the canopy.

This matters because a tree can look good going into the box, look good coming out on your end, and still not be good. You'd have no way to know.

You will lose trees. Everyone does, and most of what people learn in bonsai they learn that way. I just want the reason to be something you can learn from. I never want the lesson to be that you can't trust me.