From a half-dead nursery plant to a bonsai

This yew is one of five plants that were planted together in one large pot — a so-called cassette. It was one meter tall. The plant had come a long way: it was brought to us from a nursery in Italy. About a month after they arrived, the plants started to die. Only one of them still had a few green branches.

Five years ago, at the end of February, I decided to save the plant by repotting it into another, larger pot and trying to make a bonsai out of it. Before repotting, I cut off the whole dead upper part and trimmed away all the dead branches. It turned out that the plants had practically no roots. Presumably, when they were potted up, more roots had been cut off than the plant needed to feed itself.

For a year after repotting, I gave it a root growth stimulant twice and fed it regularly, once every 2 weeks, with “Organika”. For 2 years I didn’t touch it; I was waiting for the plant to “gain strength”. At the end of October 2015 I tried styling it for the first time: I trimmed it and wired it. By chance I found a rather beautiful bonsai pot of the right size, and in March 2016 I planted it in that pot. In July of the same year (eight months after wiring) I removed the wire. Once a year I trimmed the branches that had grown out. Unfortunately, some of the bonsai’s branches did not hold their shape after the wire came off.

At the end of September 2018 I wired it again. I probably won’t touch it again until May 2019; I hope the tree will hold this shape and turn into a beautiful bonsai.