I had a Chinese elm that I purchased some years back. One of those - "Oh that seems like good value..." at the time and then - it's actually poo tickets!
Beset with problems - none the least being awful aerial roots and a terrible structure. I can't find photos of when I purchased it - so perhaps I knew it was a bad impulse buy. A few years back - I decided to experiment by laying it down. I thought there may be an interesting raft there. At the time - I didn't realise that Chinese elm are hard to kill - so I thought I was being kinda brave! Hardly!
Anyway - I stripped the underside bark and applyied rooting hormone gel and checked it in a green planter box.I then waited and earlier this year, I lifted it to see what had occurred. All sorts of good stuff had occurred. So I changed changes the training pot to a flatter tray, splayed and arranged the roots for better nebari and arranged it how I thought might look ok.
This morning, it had its first trim this season. A raft in training bit more enjoyable (for me) than the ugly tree it was prior.
You'll also see at the end a range of root cuttings I took - seems that most of them decided to survive too. The first photo I have - after I have played the trunk down. Some time later, I pulled it up to see what had happened. Good stuff had happened. I arranged the roots. And gave it it's first Spring haircut today. The roots cuttings took too! Now I have a more interesting project and that impulse buy may turn out to be OK value after all.
