Tattooed Beech

Tattooed Beech

Who would have thought to tattoo a tree, well Simon Temblett did just that with his creative flare and design to challenge the artistry of bonsai and sculpture which is an inspiration to us all.

This is an incredible tree, that went from being a very uninteresting common beech (Fagus sylvatica) to something so much more, just through having a tattooed trunk. Simon carved the cork off the bark but did not carve deep enough to affect the xylem and phloem cells just below the bark as beech are a very thin barked species.

He also linked old pruning wounds with carving and during this work observed that where branches have been removed that dieback occurs at the base of those wounds creating a V-shaped area of die back on wounds towards bottom which he puts down to the route of the sap and downwards flow.

He has already experimented previously on trees making faces on mature larger trees and wanted to try to make a less interesting piece of material into something beautiful with a more artistic approach.

He realised once completing the carving that this had an impact upon the health of the tree, he got smaller leaves as well as yellow leaves initially but the tree is now recovering nicely.

The tree is still far from being refined and will need a very plain bonsai pot that is curved, not square. Simon is hopeful that he can continue to improve the health and design of the tree over the coming years and it just shows you what you can do with a little bit of imagination, and experimentation.