Harmut Muenchebach's brilliant Bavarian backyard bonsai garden. It wouldn't be hard to indulge in a little envy here, but better to just enjoy.

Let’s keep going with perhaps the most enchantng Backyard Bonsai Gardens we’ve seen yet. It belongs to Hartmut Muenchenbach of Bavaria. I found the photos on  Walter Pall’s timeline titled Jennifer Price at Hartmut Muenchenbach’s. We originally featured it just over a year ago.

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Impressive tree in an impressive garden

A closer look at the tree's details

A strong tree and a great rock make for an impressive cliff planting. BTW, that's a lot of tree growing off that rock and a lot of weight to that side (notice how the soil runs almost all the way down the cascading trunk). It looks like the pot is fastened to the platform

Walter (left), Jennifer and Harmut

A little closer for facial recognition

Harmut Muenchebach's brilliant Bavarian backyard bonsai garden. It wouldn't be hard to indulge in a little envy here, but better to just enjoy.

Let’s keep going with perhaps the most enchantng Backyard Bonsai Gardens we’ve seen yet. It belongs to Hartmut Muenchenbach of Bavaria. I found the photos on  Walter Pall’s timeline titled Jennifer Price at Hartmut Muenchenbach’s. We originally featured it just over a year ago. –

Impressive tree in an impressive garden

A closer look at the tree's details

A strong tree and a great rock make for an impressive cliff planting. BTW, that's a lot of tree growing off that rock and a lot of weight to that side (notice how the soil runs almost all the way down the cascading trunk). It looks like the pot is fastened to the platform

Walter (left), Jennifer and Harmut

A little closer for facial recognition

I like it when people offer a peek into their inner worlds. It's a generous act. This one belongs to Zdenek Svoboda. Zdenek lives in  Skalica Slovakia, a place that's a mystery to me

Picking up our Backyard Bonsai series with a visit to Zdenek Svoboda in Slovakia (via his timeline on fb). There are plenty more great photos where these came from. If my count is correct, this is our 17th backyard display. Our first was Wolfgang Putz’ yard, in May, 2009

By the way, if you have a bonsai display in your backyard, we’d love to see it

Zdenek has some impressive bonsai sprinkled around his yard. We can tell it's a pine, but no variety is given

Another view

Ficus benjimina

You can see a piece of the house in this one. Including the glassed in nook with a good view of the yard

Looks like a clump style Japanese white pine

On more view. There are more on Zdenek's timeline

The artist at work

This flowering Privet belongs to Harry Harrington (as does the wristwatch). I took the liberty to crop the original photo (see below) for a closer view

Our talented and prolific friend Harry Harrington is at it again. Here’s his caption for the tree shown here (from his fb timeline)…
“I think this is quite a rare occurrence, one of my Privet (Ligustrum ovalifolium) bonsai not only flowering, but in scale with the tree itself! Collected in 2009 from a hedge growing in West London, this has always been one of my favourite Privet.
Height 14″/34cm, 5″/12.5cm trunk diameter. Pot by Victor Harris of Erin Pottery. A progression series for this tree, going back to 2009, can be seen on my website”

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A bright spot

White of white

Harry's books provide numerous examples of how-to transform
 inexpensive (or no cost) stock into quality bonsai
 Both are available and discounted at Stone Lantern

The original shot provides a bit more scale. That's Harry's arm, artfully  adorned

This is what it looked like freshly dug back in 2009. Impressive eh?

Same tree, different angle. From a post we did in April of last year

Stupendous is a good start in the search for words to describe this old full cascade Pemphis acidula by Budi Sulistyo. Ahh, to live in the tropics where stuff like this grows everywhere (well, not exactly like this, but still...). I first saw it in facebook in an album entitled My bonsai by Budi. By the way, Budi lives in Indonesia

I’d venture that we’ve seen as many astounding Pemphis acidula as almost any other bonsai variety. Especially if we’re talking tropicals. Yesterday we featured three (along with some other tropical wonders), which got me thinking. Why not take a journey back to our original Bonsai Bark Pemphis? So here it is, from April, 2010. It was titled, Budi’s Stupendous Bonsai. The closeups below were added today

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Two closer looks at the details. Apologies for the fuzz

A fruiting tree from Budi's album. I don't know what it is, but I like it

Budi with his monster

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Not technically a cascading bonsai, but the foliage does cascade down along the trunk. Almost like a waterfall. Speaking of the trunk, not only does it express more than enough power and grace, but the way the grooved deadwood at the base of the trunk twists around behind and pops out again toward the top adds a nice touch. The tree is listed as Pemphis which is a genus of tropical plants. The species isn't given but when it comes to bonsai Pemphis usually (always?) mean Pemphis acidula

Today’s featured artist, Trang Jira lives in Bangkok, Thailand. His trees are unique and unlike most of the trees we show, they don’t owe that much to the Japanese bonsai tradition.* They may be closer to Chinese Penjing, but to my eye they stand on their own.

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Though I like all of what I've seen of Trang Jira's trees, this one, with its clean simple lines is a winner. The tree is a clump style Casuarina with a very impressive nebari. Casuarina is a genus. No species is given

Reclining bonsai. It's another Pemphis

A little more conventional* than the others, but the strong undulating trunk with its textured bark is still pretty impressive. It's one of the numerous species in the Diospyios genus. Trang Jira doesn't say which

Stacked. The trunks and the foliage pads seem to mirror each other. It's another Pemphis

Close up of the pads and strange beast sticking out on the right. Can't decide if it's a snake or baby bird with a long neck

Is this one tree in two pots? Or do you need new glasses? Until right now, this was the only Trang Jira tree we’ve shown here on Bark. It’s from a post we did last August titled ‘Is This Really One Tree in Two Pots?‘ It’s another Diospyios

*In North America and much of the West, the art of bonsai is heavily influenced by the Japanese bonsai tradition.

Winner of the Finest Bonsai Masterpiece at the 5th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition. It's a Mountain Hemlock (Tsuga Mertensiana) that belongs to Eric Schikowski. The photo is by Joseph Noga as are all the photos in Exhibition Albums 2-5.

Just a friendly reminder…
It’s time to make your plans. The 6th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition is the premier North American celebration of bonsai. The one event you don’t want to miss and it’s only a little more than two months away. We look forward to seeing you there!

Time to register and make your accommodations plans and Bill Valavanis has all the information you need right here

This Colorado blue spruce won the All American Award (Finest American Species in an American Container, Displayed on an American Table) at the 5th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition. It belongs to Jason Eider.

Another Colorado blue spruce. This one won the ABS North American Bonsai Award at the 5th U.S. Exhibition. It belongs to Todd Schlafer

The following is from Bill Valavanis’ Exhibition website…
“The world bonsai community will once again be enriched by the display of bonsai gathered from across the United States at the 6th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition, September 8-9, 2018, in Rochester, NY. 

“Like Japan’s Kokufu Bonsai Exhibition, people from around the world attend the U.S. National Bonsai Exhibitions to appreciate and study the diversity of the unique and distinctive species displayed by accomplished bonsai artists from across the United States.

“Towering bonsai from the Pacific Northwest, rugged bonsai from the Rocky Mountains, and tropical bonsai from the Southern swampy regions will be displayed alongside weathered bonsai from the Southwestern deserts and refined deciduous bonsai from the Northeast.”

Immigrant species are welcome. This Japanese black pine is also from the 5th U.S. National Exhibition. It belongs to John Kirby. You can find it and over 200 other distinctive bonsai in the 5th Exhibition Album. We still have some albums from the 4th Exhibition as well (1,2 & 3 are sold out, and according to Bill, there are no plans to reprint)

About 6 weeks ago I dug about 70 field grown trees (mostly Larch) from my land and put them in training pots. My plan is to offer some of them at the upcoming 6th U.S. National Bonsai Exhibition in September. Almost immediately after digging they started rooting and pushing healthy new foliage. Now, it’s time to fertilize, so today they’ll each get a handful (more or less depending on the tree’s size) of Green Dream Fertilizer pellets, with an application of Micro Total to follow next week.

I’ll continue to use Green Dream, Dyna-gro Bonsai Pro liquid and Micro Total through the summer, tapering off in August to just a couple light applications of Green Dream and Micro Total in order to slow growth  and hopefully end up with nice tight foliage for the show.
We look forward to seeing you there!

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This powerful old Satsuki azalea belongs to Boon Manakitivipart. The shot was taken just before spring pruning. Boon's caption with this shot and the one just below is... "Satsuki azalea Debloom and thinning"

Boon Manakitivipart (Bonsai Boon) is one of our favorites and has appeared numerous times here over the years. In addition to being a highly accomplished and prolific bonsai artist, Boon is teacher to many of the best American bonsai artists. The photos shown here were taken from Boon’s timeline. Three of them are first timers here.

You might notice that flowers were removed during spring pruning on this Satsuki azalea (see photo just below). Heavy pruning is often done in the spring when plants are most vigorous. This helps insure speedy recovery and allows plenty of time for next year’s buds to set. In this process, it’s not unusual to remove this year’s blooms. Hopefully after you’ve had a little time to enjoy them. –

After pruning. It almost seems a crime to remove the beautiful flowers, but sometimes the long term wins out.

Another of Boon's Satsuki azaleas. I borrowed it from our archives. Here's our original caption... "This Satsuki azalea’s trunk reminds me of some of Antoni Gaudi’s sculptural architecture that graces the great city of Barcelona. Though in truth, the tree resides in Boon Manakitivipart’s impressive bonsai collection in the great city of Alameda, California" (Boon has since moved to Hayward, another Bay Area City).

Boon at work. He doesn't say what the tree is. The leaves look like they might be Katsura, but there are other type trees with heart shaped leaves, so don't take my guess to the bank

With bonsai, it's almost always the tree that dominates, even though the pot, (stone, slab or whatever) is considered a critical part of the whole. In this case however, it's the rock that elevates the planting to extraordinary. Or, you might say it's the rock and the way it's adorned by the old tree along with the moss and ferns, that makes this planting extraordinary. The tree is a Japanese quince (Chaenomeles japonica). The tree, rock and moss belong to David Benavente.

Staying close to theme, we’ll move from root-over-rock bonsai to root-on-rock bonsai. This post is from July, 2015, with some value added today–

In this close up the bark speaks of great age and the tree's precarious position and gnarled shape tell a story of hard times and survival.

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The rock!

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Here's an equally impressive and improbable Benavente planting. The main tree seems so relaxed and natural given its precarious position. It's a Scot's pine (Pinus sylvestris) and the others are Japanese quince (Chaenomeles japonica). As with the planting above, there are also ferns and moss. I'll guess the convex slab is man made. Speaking of convex, how does that fern underneath ever get enough light?

As long as we're talking about root-on-convex slabs, here's a famous Japanese white pine planting by Masahiko Kimura that graces the cover of our also famous Kimura (aka The Magician) book.