Planning at the January Meeting

The typical northeast Ohio weather made travel difficult, and so we lacked our usual membership at the January meeting. Nevertheless, Gib still plugged away on this awesome little white pine, and some good ideas for workshops, demos, perhaps a project tree species for the year, and other club activities were tossed around.

Don't forget you 2011 dues--still on 20 bucks, and also please turn in the member profile sheet to Dan.

Bring a Tree & Help Us Plan at the January Meeting

Happy New Year from the Akron Canton Bonsai Society!

The next ACBS meeting will be Thursday, January 6th at 7:00 at the Cuyahoga Valley Arts Center in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio. The meeting focus will be two fold:

• Bring a tree to work on
• Planning for the coming year

It's always fun to collaborate on projects, so bring a tree to work on at this meeting. It is always good to see what projects other members have on their plate, and how these trees develop over time.

Also, think about what programs that might be of interest and what artistic or horticultural skills you might like to acquire or develop. See you there.

The Bending Fun Continues

At the November meeting, more ACBS members brought their pet-flex wrapped and wired black pines in for a workout. But this month there was a big addition from one of our members who came prepared.

Jim had some of his friends at a fabricating shop make him a serious bending tool. It consisted of a steel bar with 4 nuts welded at the business end. This allowed some choice in the spacing for the three bolts that did the work. The tool was considerably longer than the one used by Jeff Carr at the September "Extreme Bending" workshop.. So much so the that the comment was made that it may not be legal in some states. :) They were just kidding though. The thing worked great, and you just couldn't help but to love it. The tool was big and it was mean, but it was just a blast to work with, and we were all tripping over ourselves to try it out. A terrific "cheater bar" of sorts. Archimedes himself would have been proud to see it. What was it he said when he outlined the principals leverage-- "Give me a place to stand, and I will move the world." Well at least a tough branch.

It will be fun to see how these black pine respond and develop in a season or two. More photos of these member projects will be posed in the extreme bending album on our gallery site-- http://picasaweb.google.com/akroncantonbonsai Also, don't forget to check the Virtual Fall show album posted there. We have photos of some of our maples and other deciduous trees there from the past couple of seasons. If you're interested in bonsai and live in the Akron / Canton area join us at on of our monthly meetings. Email us for info at
akroncantonbonsai@gmail.com

October Meeting: Bring Your Own Tree

Who says you have to plan for a good meeting?

Sometimes a bring your own tree night can create some spontaneous fun and variety for the club. This impromptu workshop, saw a continuation of last month's extreme bending as a few members began black pine bending projects of their own--like Anne's cool creation from a pencil "straight is boring" seedling to something that wants to tell a story. More photos of member tree-bending projects at the meeting were just posted in the Jeff Car Bending album at our gallery http://picasaweb.google.com/akroncantonbonsai.

Other ad libs at the October meeting included Dave's ficus re-pot and trim, Cheryl's bougainvillea maintenance , Carlton's white pine adjustments, and check out Larry's carving job that he recently completed to create an awesome walnut stand for this tear drop shaped black stone from the Lake Erie shore. Very cool.
Interested in bonsai? Join us on the first Thursday of each month at the Cuyahoga Valley Art Center in Cuyohoga Falls, Ohio.

Extreme Bending by Jeff Carr

In an amazingly cool demo, Jeff Carr of the Staselwood Bonsai Studio in Newark, Ohio showed our club some techniques of extreme bending. Working on this Japanese black pine, he wrapped layers of a sticky bandage-like material called Petflex along the trunk of the tree along with copper wire.

Then using with a bending tool, he began to work the straight tree over. This was done gradually by repeating the bending several times. Each time, letting the tree flex back. He also worked the tool along the trunk and continued to bend it an let it flex back. Over time, and repeated actions, the tree remained bent over enough to pull it down and secure the bend by tying stay of copper wire.

This gradual process of persuading the tree over changed it's entire look from an upright tree to a cascade--see photo.

Jeff then completed wiring both the main and secondary branches. He worked the two main branches--one to create an apex and the other downward to continue the cascade. He commented on how these branches contributed to the over all design. He noted that keeping what he called "the energy flow" or the motion of the tree's movement consistent--including in the directions that the foliage pads faced--unified the whole look of the tree. At that point he "foreshortened" the smaller branches to bring them into foliage areas.

Overall, this was a fascinating demonstration, and showed how when working with our trees, it is often possible to open your thinking into more radical design possibilities.

See our gallery site for a step by step series of photos from Jeff Carr's extreme bending demonstration at the link below: http://picasaweb.google.com/akroncantonbonsai

August 2010 ACBS Show in North Canton, Ohio

This year's August show was set in a smaller location than in past years. However, the new location with its classic hanging milk-glass lights and neutral white background provided an intimate gallery-like setting for the bonsai displayed the exhibit.

Nearly 90 trees from a dozen club members showed the wide variety of styles and species. Members like Cheryl lent more interest to the program by working on some styling during the event. The exhibit had a steady stream of visitors throughout the weekend.

Some of tropical species--such as the fine ficus narrow folia pictured at the bottom right-- were especially lush in the midst of this unusually warm growing season. Some of the native trees, such as the arborvitae on the bottom left also displayed good summer growth. It was terrific to see some of the newer members of the club contribute their trees as well as seeing how some of the specimen tree projects of our more experienced people continue to develop in character and quality. In a sense, the exhibit, which many consider to be "the attraction" of the North Canton Main Street Festival was a fitting celebration of the art of bonsai as we shared our trees with the community.

You can view all of the pictures of the exhibit at our gallery site http://picasaweb.google.com/akroncantonbonsai
Much thanks to all members who participated in the exhibit.

ACBS June Exhibition

This year's June show drew many visitors, and it is always a delight to see how our members' trees are progressing. Many trees that have been exhibited in the past are now developing toward "specimen tree" status. The juniper and pine projects highlighted the show.

Unfortunately, we missed the azalea blossoms by about a week. The warm weather this year brought the flowers out a little sooner than usual. Still, a well attended show with many members at all skill levels participated, and we had many good remarks from our visitors to the exhibit.

See our gallery site for more photos from this show and from past shows at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/akroncantonbonsai

Our next exhibition will be in August at the North Canton Street Festival. Hope to see everyone there.