Most of you have heard of #overwintering and other techniques that bonsai enthusiasts have practice to keep their trees from dying in the extreme temperatures that some countries or regions experience. I on the other hand will be removing my shading nets I put up this summer.
You can see in the photo above that I had to put up a 80% shading net on the one side of my garden to keep the trees from drying out during summer. Now that the days are shorter and colder I have to move my trees around a lot more to get sufficient sunlight. I have a lot or patients but I hate running up and down in the rain trying to shift trees around. As a side effect of the thick net the water dams up and the pours down in the middle of the net where the weight of the water is the heaviest.
I have known about this problem for sometime now but have only seen its effects to this scale earlier this morning. The two trees below the middle of the net has it’s soil mixture washed out by the heavy flow of water. Its fine for now but if this goes on for the duration of the winter I will not have and soil left in these containers. I know what your thinking. Just move the trees below the area where the water dams up. Well I have thought of that, but there is no where to move the trees to my display area is filled to the last inch. I have about two hundred trees in a four meter by four meter area. That adds up to about twelve and a half trees per square meter.
The red line in the illustration above shows you where the water disturbs the soil the most. Its not as clear in the photo but you get the idea. It was to cold and wet outside to get the perfect shot.
I need to change the way my shading nets are so that I can pull them aside when not needed and close the garden when needed. I want to invest in a pulley system that will make my live so much simpler. So I investigated and researched a few different methods that I can use to build what I want. I had to keep two things in mind. The purpose of the net was not just to keep the sun out and protect my tree from the harsh African climate. But also to keep them safe and out of reach of the creative elements that like borrowing whatever does not belong to them. I needed to find something that worked for both purposes. I decided to get mesh to put over the net so when the net is pulled open the mesh should still keep out unwanted guests! The only thing holding me back now is money. I will remove the net so long so that the sun and rain can get to all the trees and as soon as my budget allows it I will put up the net and later the pulley system.
I will have to extend my garden area as well. The trees are to close to one another and does not display well when people come to visit and I take them through the garden. There is no real flow to the way it laid out now so I will have to redesign the entire area, but for now the first step will be to just take off the 80% net.
Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. Please feel free to leave you comments below.
Bonsaiwithromano 