Defoliating Bonsai Trees скачать в хорошем качестве

Defoliating Bonsai Trees

Defoliating is seen by the uninformed as the means by which bonsai are kept small. This is almost backwards. Bonsai are small and removing the leaves is a consequence of the size. Removing leaves causes the new buds to be smaller and more numerous. This gives the tree a boost to metabolism and consequential growth. This more vigorous tree is counter intuitive if the common misconceptions are to be believed. Removing leaves does stunt the growth of a bonsai for a short time. It is a short term loss for long term gains. This is why you remove leaves during the growing season. This minimizes the impact of removing them and they grow back quickly. The tree comes back with more metabolizing leaves with more surface area for photosynthesis. This leads to more energy. Maple species are a good example of how defoliating helps that was not included. Removing the new leaves and shortening the branches back to two buds or nodes allows the tree to have branches and grow shorter. Maples only grow new branches from nodes. These nodes can grow very far apart if the tree undergoes periods of fast growth. Defoliating can shorten these gaps. Most bonsai rely on some form of defoliation. This could be a simple matter of pinching out juniper needle tips. Or the middle ground of reducing the leaf size. This is linked to the number of leaves. The number of leaves is than linked to tree growth. It could also be complex like the candle removal of pine trees. This is also important in maintaining the silhouette of your tree. If you left a tree to grow the leaves would gradually but surely move beyond the shape you wanted. If you only cut it back once these leaves were too far out the inner branches would be bare of leaves. Defoliating the tree does several more things. It keeps that silhouette and causes leaves to form further back in towards the tree trunk. This avoids the issue of bare inner branches. The process of removing the foliage also encourages growth the branches. As these thicken the trunk also grows slightly. This also supports greater root mass below the soil surface. More leaves means more roots that facilitate growth. All of this has another, final, benefit if your bonsai blooms. Most bonsai will reduce the size of flowers if the leaves reduce in size. This can help in scaling your tree. Large flowers will not shrink drastically but smaller flowers will.