Dark Star Wild Lilac - Day 1

I'm starting into a new hobby - bonsai. At this point, I don't even know if bonsai is a noun, verb, adverb, etc. but I intend to find out. The first thing learned is that it's pretty unlikely that bonsaiing (is that a word??) is going to be pretty unsatisfying with only one plant. Every year or so, usually in the spring time, the plant is brought in and trimmed. Once in a while you "wire" the plant to get the growth going in the direction you want. Every so often you repot the plant to ensure it's getting the right nutrients. So, maybe you work on it for a month out of a year. The rest of the time, it's a very serene hobby, like watching grass grow!

Since I might want my hobby to be a little more active than that, I went to Home Depot and chose a couple of shrubs for my first adventure into bonsaiing. It's a Dark Star Wild Lilac, Ceanothus Dark Star by it's botanical name, characterized by being a California native species, both a "honey" and a "butterfly" plant with dense, small leaved, purple buds and blue flowers. It prefers full sun, lean soil and little or no water. It's deer and drought resistant. Sounds like a pretty hardy plant, and that may be just what I need for my first foray into bonsaiing.

So first step plans for the Dark Star are to repot it to get most of the trunk above the soil and get the main roots exposed. After that I may ask Deb's help in thinking through the aesthetics of the tree and begin the trimming process.

Stay tuned!!