Newsletter – August 2019

Bonsai Notebook

Bring a tree to get advice on a pot choice.

The August 10 meeting at the Arboretum will feature Nathan Simmons. It will be Nathan’s first visit to our club and he will be displaying and talking about bonsai pots. Many of you know Nathan and have seen him at bonsai events selling beautiful pots. Come and hear about his favorite potters and learn about tree/pot combinations.
Nathan has been a bonsai artist for 10 years, and Roy Nagatoshi was his first teacher. He has also studied with Ted Matson, Tak Shimazu, Mauro Stemberger, Ryan Neil, and Will Baddeley. His current sensei is John Wang. Nathan prefers large bonsai and has about 100 trees in pots. He has an additional 300 trees growing in the ground.

Over the years, Nathan has developed a passion for Japanese bonsai pots. He owns several hundred pots of all sizes and enjoys collecting, appreciating, and selling them. He is a bonsai pot vendor at most big bonsai events, like the Bonsai-A-Thon.

If you have a tree and would like help with a pot choice, bring your tree to the meeting, and Nathan will offer advice for the best choice.

Meeting Time and Place:
August 10, 2019 at 7pm
LAC Arboretum/ Palm Room

President’s Corner

The real summer heat is upon us. Last year we had some excessively high heat. It came on so fast, many of our trees couldn’t adjust quickly enough and sustained burned foliage.

Watering is obviously critical. Try and water early in the morning so water can soak in well before the heat evaporates it. The soil in smaller pots will naturally dry out quicker and will probably need additional watering on the 100 degree-plus days. Misting foliage can help slow the evaporative process and, hopefully, prevent foliage from burning. Cloud Cover is a product you can also spray onto foliage to slow evaporation. It is available at most nurseries… Just follow the instructions.

The warm summers bring on new tip growth on plants, and can result in a lot of over-growth.in our finely shaped trees. Keep up with trimming, especially with junipers, so the sun can get into the middle of trees and promote growth near the trunk.

~Dave

July 2019 Meeting Highlights

We had a great turnout for our July meeting at Peter Macasieb’s home. Thanks go to both Peter and Marissa for their hospitality again this year. We also very much appreciate all of the members who contributed to the food table and helped Marissa throughout this evening.

Good food was abundant, and the desserts were outstanding. Peter’s outdoor fan system and patio cover kept us comfortable. His tree collection has continued to grow, so there were many amazed and envious observers admiring Peter’s trees.

Peter’s demo tree for the raffle was a small California juniper. He said he specifically collected more smaller junipers than large sizes so he could develop them into shohin. The tree had a fat trunk Peter had previously carved into a beautiful style to save time. He used audience participation to decide which branches to remove.

He kept the branches he needed for styling his image of the tree and wired every branch. In the end, the new shohin looked great, and everyone wanted to take it home.

Peter’s work resulted in a lot of enthusiastic raffle ticket buyers.The raffle table was overflowing with pots, trees and related items, so we had a lot of happy members with each ticket drawn. Gonzalo Rodriquez took home the fabulous shohin at the end of the evening.

Members Corner

  • We need your help…. to find an offsite location for our November 9, 2019 meeting. The Arboretum is hosting the Moonlight Forest so we will be unable to meet in our usual Arboretum Room. November is typically cold and may be rainy so we need to find an indoor location in the Arcadia/ Pasadena area. The room needs to be large enough to handle our demonstration and raffle activities & being able to bring food in for our refreshment table would be a bonus. If you know of a site and person/ organization please give Dave and Lorraine the site and contact information, or leave a message on Dave’s cell 909 519 5391 and we will follow up. Thanks.
  • The newsletter is always available on our website www.sabonsai.org. If you have a knack for writing, a story to tell, a photo or something you would like to share in our newsletter please submit it to Lorraine prior to the 20th of any month at [email protected].
  • Visitors are always welcome at our meetings….come check out SABS anytime.

A very special “thank you “ to Marissa and Peter Macasieb for hosting our July Meeting

Upcoming Events

Aug 29-Sept 1
Kofu Bonsai Kai Annual Show at the Bowers Museum
2002 N. Main St., Santa Ana

Sept 21-22
San Diego Bonsai Club 53rd Annual Show
Casa del Prado Rm #101, Balboa Park
10a-5p daily, bonsai trees and related items on sale

Oct. 24-27
GSBF Convention 42
Riverside Convention Center, see website for details, www.gsbfbonsai.org

Come Join Us

Next Meeting
Date: August 10, 2019
Time: 7pm
Location:
LAC Arboretum, Palm Room
301 N. Baldwin Ave., Arcadia, CA 91007

6pm Board Meeting prior to general meeting

2019 Monthly Meeting Dates

Aug 10 — Nathan Simmons

Sept 14 — David Nguy (Potluck dinner meeting at the home of David & June Nguy)

Oct 12 — Mel Ikeda

Refreshment Schedule

Aug – Gabriel & Linda Gonzalez, Victor Shelton, Eunice Jee, Marge Blasingame

Sept – Potluck, bring a favorite dish, a side, salad or dessert

Oct – Walt & Octavia Chin, Peter & Marissa Macasieb

More sign up opportunities will be available at upcoming meetings