How to create a root over rock Bonsai

[kcpoole]

I have quite a few Pyracantha sitting around at the moment and I spied a small piece of rock on my bench.
As the topic often comes up, How to make a root over rock, I decided to do a little demo and make use if one of the little collected trees.

Have a look a the rock, and see if there is natural position where the tree might sit nicely, and allow the roots to hang down and look nice in a few years.
Make sure the roots on the tree are long enough to hang down and be rooted will under the rock.
Have some "Muck" handy ( muck is a sticky wet mix of clay / sand / peat moss, or anything else you have around)
Grafting tape, string, or sticky tape.
Glad wrap or similar.

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Bare root your tree and place it over the rock so the roots hang down the sides of the rock. Tie it on using grafting tape if you need to hold it while mucking

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Once the tree tied on and the roots covered in Muck. Wrap the entire rock / roots with gla wrap to hold the roots onto the rock and to direct all growth down the sides of the rock.

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Pot the tree up into the training pot and make sure you bury up to the base of the trunk. This will encourage the roots to thicken and clasp the rock tightly

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Place on you bench and treat as any other tree in development for at least a year or 2. The time will depend on several factors.
The species, if the tree is a fast grower then the time needed will be much less than a slower tree.
The size, If you are doing a larger tree / rock, you will need to allow much longer for the roots to develop. This one will be Mame / small Shohin size, and I will look at exposing the roots next winter.

Ken

[shibui]

Good luck with this one Ken. I stopped using muck for root over rock many years ago. I found that many of the roots died when covered in muck. I get better results without it. Gladwrap is ok for a rounded rock but really interesting rocks have hollows and crevices and the galdwrap does not hold the roots close to the rock in those areas. Alfoil will mould into the hollows and crevices and pushes the roots closer to the rocks in those areas. Here is my method to create root over rock bonsai - http://shibuibonsai.com.au/growing-root ... ck-bonsai/

[kcpoole]

Thanks Shibui
Never heard of people having issues with Much here so that is interesting. I did a small Maple a few weeks ago and did not use any so will be an interesting comparison when I reveal next year.

Never thought of Using foil, Might have to do another and test that as well

Ken

[Steven]

Nice pictures and write up Ken, thanks.

Neil, your link is great too!

Regards,
Steven

[Jason]

Thanks to you both, have saved both pages to my favorites Very easy to read, and you have me wanting to give it a shot now

[bamboos]

Thanks Shibui what a great tip . I have used pieces of rock bundles of string bits of cork none of which are great but alfoil scrunched up thats probably a winner
Steve

[shibui]

Just need to keep the water up to them in the first year.
Rocks act as a wick and suck the moisture out so it is important to water more than other trees until the roots are well established out the bottom.