Days are substantially longer now and the nights are getting warmer. The trees are feeling it too and have started growing new shoots for the coming season. The first to produce leaves this year was a trident maple. I love the red new shoots on tridents. As the leaves mature they will fade to green. A few of the Chinese elms have also produced fresh new leaves but these are a brilliant emerald green that will fade to a darker green as the leaves harden off. A small English elm is showing swollen buds but the larger English elms are still dormant. English elms are usually one of the last species to shoot here along with zelkova and gingko.

I have also produced a ‘first’ this year – a wisteria in a pot has flower buds swelling so I will be able to post pics of my very first flowering wisteria bonsai. I have had one wisteria for about 28 years that has stubbornly refused to flower despite trying all sorts of techniques to it. It has a great trunk and good branches and shape but I do wish it would produce even just a few of those magnificent tresses of purple that make wisteria such a stunning bonsai. Both these trees are seedlings. Wisteria is well known to take at least 7 years and often much longer to reach maturity and flower. If you want to grow a wisteria as bonsai and would like to see flowers on it I’d recomment buying one in flower or striking cuttings from a known flowering plant. Cuttings bring the maturity of the parent plant to the new plant and are capable of flowering in just a year or 2.