Is it worth it

[Isitangus]

Hi forumers quick question- a lady near me has 11 of these mature cherry blossoms for free. Before I commit to any how well will they take collection?
I would plan on basically chopping short and removing a lot/most branches so it'd just be stumps, keeping as big a root ball as possible.
And then seasol etc for aftercare?
Is it worth it? What are the chances of them surviving?


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[Isitangus]

Approx 7ft tall


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[treeman]

Is it worth it?

Definitly not.

[kcpoole]

Depends on the tree?
Are there any with redeemin features for Bonsai?
Good species?
Nice low trunk separation?,
Low branches?
Taper in lower trunk?
radial roots / Nebari

if yes to any of the above then maybe.
if yes to more than one then quite possibly

They look like they will be an easy dig so again re the above might be worth a punt.
if you decide to grab some then if you can hold off for a few months then the survival chances will be better than doing so now.

Ken

[shibui]

Cherry should survive collecting without too much trouble. I agree with Ken about timing - winter would probably give a better survival but I think you'd have a fair result even now.

The tree surviving your transplant and the tree being any value as bonsai are two very different questions though and here i tend to agree with Treeman - the one you have shown has very little value as a bonsai The only value for you that I could see from the excercise is the things you will learn that may be useful when other trees that have better features become available.

I see no point in

keeping as big a root ball as possible.

when collecting for bonsai. Eventually it will have to go into a bonsai pot so you will have to cut roots short sometime. the best time to do that is when you really cut the top down while collecting. Later when it has grown new branches it will put more strain on the tree to cut roots short then.

[Isitangus]

Thanks for the feedback and input.
Unfortunately they have to come out and cannot wait until winter. I haven't seen any of the trunk lines apart from that one pic, will do a drive by and see if there is anything that strikes me.


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[Guy]

check to see if they have been budded onto a different rootstock--the bud union may be too high for a decent bonsai--some bud unions are ugly