Earlier, I had a few friends asking me about the difference between landscape penjing (shanshui Penjing, 山水盆景 in Chinese), and water-and-land penjing (shuihan penjing, 水旱盆景 in Chinese). It seemed that they were quite confused. Same here indeed, when I first learned bonsai, I always got mixed up between landscape penjing and water-and-land penjing too.

Last month, I took a 3-session bonsai class and made my very first water-and-land penjing (penjing is bonsai in Chinese) in the bonsai workshop. Before taking this class, the idea of making my own water-and-land penjing was quite intimidating. I just never thought that I could build a penjing with such complex composition…

I took a forest bonsai class earlier this month and this is the first forest bonsai I have ever made. And yes, I love my work and am proud of it.

We were given seven pine trees, a marble slab, a bonsai figurine, a piece of bonsai pot drainage mesh, and a rubber strap.

It is said that if we use a Yixing zisha teapot for many years, we can brew tea just by pouring boiling water into the empty pot. Highly praised for its porous nature, which works wonders in absorbing the flavor of tea, Yixing clay makes awesome teapots, while at the same time, is also an excellent material for making bonsai pot.

I unexpectedly found a few videos called “How to make your own bonsai” when I was watching some other videos on YouTube last night. There are quite many videos on YouTube demonstrating bonsai techniques and sharing bonsai tips, but what caught my attention are that these videos I found are demonstrated by a Japanese girl, and what she is showing is not any traditional bonsai style, but a new bonsai style called Saika Bonsai (彩花盆栽).

As our bonsai trees grow, the branches slowly increase in size. Any wire on the branches of our bonsai trees can become tight, and as it does, mark the bark. In severe cases, the wires may have dug deep into the branches and cause permanent scars.

Before a bonsai tree is potted into its final bonsai pot, it first should be potted in a training pot, where there are more space and resources for the bonsai tree to grow and develop its root system and new branches.  During this period, ramification and final branch placement will begin. When we get a
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Many people, especially bonsai beginners, wonder what types of tree are suitable for bonsai, and which types of bonsai tree they should buy. When I first started bonsai gardening, I had the same questions about bonsai trees for my bonsai teacher as well. And very soon, I learned that there is actually no tree type
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The time it takes to develop the shapes and train the branches of our bonsai trees is often painfully long. And it will be worse if we make a wrong cut after months of waiting for the bonsai tree to finally has its branches developed as trained. During the developing and training stage, we surely
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I went to the Guangzhou Penjing (Bonsai) Exhibition in Martyrs’ Park yesterday. With over 350 lingnan penjing (southern style Chinese bonsai), it’s the biggest lingnan penjing exhibition since the founding of the country. A truly A+ penjing should look just as exquisite when it is naked of leaves, as the times when it is blooming
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