I am looking to buy new hands after today 
As Gimli once said…“Still only counts as ONE…!”
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I get what you all are saying about bonsai wrist, but it is no joke. Consult a hand doctor to get exercises and get possible therapies for carpal tunnel. I have arthritis in my hands, exacerbated by doing bonsai. When my hands get bad, I use hand braces recommended by my physical therapist - much better than what you can pick up at the chain drugstores. Take care of your hands now and you will appreciate it later. 
Yes, Maryann, yes…
Been doing bonsai for a while… Today, my right knee feels like I have gout; and, my lower back is tweeking…
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Been trying to downsize… Repotted my largest trees into smaller pots so I could move em. Then last spring got a bigger Jacklin Heller (?) Elm. Two hours to dig, wheelbarrol and truck to get home. Into a 3’x3’x1’ wood pot, 2 five gallon buckets of bonsai soil… Had to slide it onto a bench using a 2"x8" ramp… next to it’s little brother. Hopefully will reduce the pot size next spring…
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Still have several large shimpaku to repot today!
Haute Bonsai!!!
How about after a 12+ hour repot of that giant field dug Acer, the only two people non -bonsai that have seen it commented solely “,I like the planter it’s in”…that’s another flavor of hard!
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Picked up my County Conservation District order yesterday. 5 each: Dug fir, Western Larch, Alpine fir, and Western paper bark Birch. Made forests with each…Also got 3 Kinikinic (for landscaping) and five milkweed (corms ?) for the monarch butterflys…
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Can we see them, to ease the pain of spring bonsai?
Not much to look at yet…
Alpine fir
Doug fir
Western larch
Last years Western Birch (this years are just sticks…)
Last years local seeded / grown Japanese Larch…(thnx Marty…)
I DO have way older / showable forests…
Bonsai On…
Ya, spring in the Pacific N.W.
Last week I took a long look at the predicted night temps here.
Decided to put my inside winter trees out (only 8…)… last night was 23F…
Bonsai On!
AAAAnd… now its snowing…
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Finally hit 75F!
My large Norway maple leaf growth was hardened off… defoilation time! (Partial…) every other leaf and 3/5 of the rest…
Let the bodies ht the floor!
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This tree took this real well last year.
(There is a approach root graft growing there in front…)
Ya…
Bonsai On…
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I restarted doing bonsai in 2020 after a ten years hiatus, and every year I add a new row of tables. Next step is improving my rainwater collection system and then I’ll start working on a pond and a large ground growing area at the back of the garden. I didn’t do a crazy amount of repotting this year but next spring is going to be hard!
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@vinc welcome back! What does your rainwater collecting system look like? Whats your plan? Ive also been thinking around that a lot lately.
Thanks! The first two years I was using a 1000 L water tank connected to the roof of the house (with another one as a backup) and I was watering by hand but I got more trees and at some point it was just too time consuming. So I switched to public water for 2 years but it’s too alkaline. I’m planning on adding a pump to the water tank and adding more tanks to collect more water.
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Sounds like a lit of work @vinc . Just put a conditioning filter inline of the hose… chlorine and most of the alkalinity problem solved…
The inorganic and organic fertalizer adds it back…
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Even though it’s June, spring still has some wonders to pop up…
(For the arancnoid-phobics— look away…!)
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Late summer…I usually have one or two Cats Ear spiders webs on my acre property. Always see new nestlings in late spring. They congregate in a bunch for several hours, and then ‘baloon away’… except one… that stays in the same general area…
Back porch pergola this a.m.
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They are about 1 /8 the size of a sesame seed… I moved several out to my bonsai area (on a leaf…) , then noticed there were already tiny webs there… catching the nats from the organic fertilizer!
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Oh ya… leaf rollers, green and black aphids, adelgids, slugs and scale everywhere! Gotta love spring…
Bonsai On!
KurtP
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I’ve been dealing with Sawfly larva. Their ability to defoliate a full size tree in the ground is scary and impressive.
I saw a LOT of Dolerus sp black sawfly here (eastern Wa state.) Last summer. Saw several yesterday.
They (information…) supposedly lay eggs on grasses…
Adults… do some pollination… suck some maple sap(?).
Freeked me out; they were swarming several unrelated bonsai… I thought they were a parasitic wasp…
KP
Yikes sounds horrific. The birch around here get hit hard here in northeast. I have a few in my landscape and only one as a bonsai. Luckily the bonsai was the only one that escaped some sort of defoliation.
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