Bonsai in the old stable

In the village close to where I live is a happening once every summer called "Speaking-in-the-mill-day". It is music and entertainment in an old mill, and usually some small art exhibition in the stable beside. This year it was bonsai instead of paintings in the stable. As you can see the walls are partly old and partly new, painted white, and they make a very nice backgound for bonsai!

I brought the trees that looked "the least bad" at the moment. I got compliments from surprised villagers that have never seen bonsai at all... And then there was one plant rights defender, a person that feels sorry for the poor bent trees and want to liberate them and take them back into the forest. I thought we had "informed away" those opinions by now, but obviously not!

Ficus nerifolia or ficus sikkimensis

Once I wrote about a ficus with narrow leaves, ficus nerifolia. I got a cutting of the species from a bonsai friend, and tried to root it. "I have had luck with many species before" I said, and was confident. For example I once rooted a podocarpus, which is a conifer and should therefore be difficult to root. OK. But this ficus I did not have success with, it just withered. Instead my friend proved to be a better gardener than me and had success (but she says it took long time) - and rooted a new cutting that she gave to me! This plant is still very small and thin. Now suddenly it has got these interesting small flowers or fruits! They are just a few millimeters in size, and look like small lemons. Interesting to see what will become of them!

This species is difficult to get to buy in Sweden. My friend bought her plant from Beck Bonsai, Germany.
They call it ficus sikkimensis. I don't know if there is a difference, but I am happy as long as it is a ficus with narrow leaves.

(The podocarpus died later, but I promise it had a lot of roots when it died. I think it died from bad care from its owner. Me that is.)

Short notes from this summer (for the future)

 Notes from the summer -2013:

It has been warm and sunny so far. Flowers and everything has come much earlier than what is normal.

Many of my pines had big brown parts in the needles. I don't know the reason for this, first I thought I had been too late with taking them up from the ground, but when I checked it was the same time as last year and in fact as every year. (Or OK, almost every year, for in 2010 I had it all done in may...) But maybe the very hot beginning of summer made them dry.