President’s Message
March is the month when a bonsai hobbyist starts to see their bonsai trees become more active with swelling buds and new leaves starting to appear. The whole outside garden becomes an actively growing spectacle once again for us to see and appreciate. This is my favorite time of year, when we begin to see the results of our previous years of bonsai care and repotting. It is the time of year that refreshes my soul with great anticipation for spring and the warmer days just around the corner.
A Time to Reflect
At this time, I would like to thank John Thompson for his lively demonstration of the repotting process he gave at this past first Thursday's meeting. In a period of two hours he completely repotted two trees, one from a nursery container, and the second a lovely maple tree he has had for many years. He covered every aspect of the repotting procedure along with answering all questions that members had throughout the evening. It was truly an act of love on his part, since JT's time is more limited now as his wife Cindy is sick and needs special daily care.
And for our third Thursday meeting we were entertained by a special guest speaker. Denise Soultanian, a creative local potter shared her very diverse and lovely pots which she brought for us to examine and purchase. In addition, she gave an informative talk about her processes that showed her diversity and willingness to accommodate our special bonsai style and needs. Many of our club members purchased pots and realized a greater appreciation of the art that she displayed and demonstrated. Thanks Denise for enlightening us with your special gift and pots!
The remaining part of the evening was occupied with our normal workshop with club members.
Our Coming Programs for March
How many of you have heard about the bonsai art of Saikei? Jack Callon, a long time fellow club member asked the club to do a special presentation on this wonderful historical art form of bonsai. Jack has taken great interest in rock plantings over the years, showing groupings of trees styled as rock plantings, illustrating this special art form of Saikei. Now he wants to share with us how groupings of miniature trees in a shallow pot can depict a living miniature forest environment, and how to make and care for that forest. Jack has books that show wonderful examples of this art form that dates back to post World War II in Japan. I hope many of us will be inspired to try our hand at a Saikei after seeing Jack's presentation.
Our third Thursday meeting will be a normal workshop for club members to bring in their trees for help and to get answers to all of their questions. This will be your last chance to repot most of the trees in your collection, so bring in your tools and the soil necessary for this operation.
Our Cherry Blossom Bonsai Show is Next Month
April means that the cherry trees are in full bloom, and with that, we look forward to our bonsai show we put on every year at the Quinlan Community Center in Cupertino. This is a two day show, April 30th and May 1st, where our club has a chance to display many of our member’s bonsai trees and in addition have a place to work on our trees at the show. This is an annual fun event for our club where hundreds of local residents pass through inspecting our trees and asking questions about their age and development. With that in mind, the club needs to start to organize volunteers to support the transportation of the backgrounds and tables needed for our tree displays. In addition, a sign-up sheet will be passed around at the next few meetings for those who have trees to be included and be displayed. We need various sizes of trees and accent plants. Trees that are in full bloom or seasonal are always popular. Be sure to bring the show tables that accompany your trees. This is a two day event where it's nice to exchange out trees for the second day, adding diversity to our club show.
Our display intro table with club literature to be passed out needs additional accent plants, interesting collected rocks and any miniature blossoming plants you may have. Questions regarding this show and how you can be a part of it will be discussed at coming meetings and next month’s newsletter.
A Special Beginners Bonsai Workshop Class
For those of you who would like to get additional help and instruction for your bonsai trees, the club will be offering a beginners class starting in March. Your instructor will be Juan Cruz, a dedicated bonsai artist who loves teaching the art of bonsai. He will cover all basic aspects of this amazing hobby. Juan will be starting his first class in March at our usual workshop on our third Thursday meeting. There will be an up front $5.00 charge to cover the four classes over a four month period. Please contact Juan at our first monthly meeting and let him know that you would like to be included with this group, a 6 person limit for the class. Juan will let you know what materials you'll need to bring to each class each month.
On a Personal Matter
It was brought to my attention at the last board meeting that many of our regular club members have not yet renewed their yearly club dues. Our club each month runs on a very tight budget, and it's the dues that keeps us running, so please, take care of this important matter at our next meeting. Jeff Escallier is the person to see! Thanks.
Have a great month doing bonsai everyone!