Experimenting with creating bonsai is a great way to learn, and I happened across a reasonably priced plaited trunked Ficus in a garden store last year and wanted to find out a bit more about how they actually create the plaited trunks so I bought one to find out.
Below is the stages following purchase through to repotting to understand how they make them.
- Ficus as purchased
- Removed from pot and soil removed from roots
- Exposed roots of each trunk
- Wire ties where applied around each plaited joint but most had disintegrated by now
- Trunks have fused in the majority of places where the stems touch
- You can see method of how the trunks were stabilised
- Bamboo canes inserted into the base of each trunk
- Image following 3 months pruning of the crown to develop a more compact form
- Examples of other ones available
- Larger examples
- Really fused trunks
- Examples of a range of plaited trunks
There are some excellent examples of live tree shaping too which capture the imagination and I love the work of Axel Eriandson and there is no end to the creatitivity trees inspire from seats to living root bridges.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/23/Needle_n_thread.jpg/170px-Needle_n_thread.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1a/Erlandson_basket.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a3/Pete_in_garden_chair_01.jpg/439px-Pete_in_garden_chair_01.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Living_root_bridges%2C_Nongriat_village%2C_Meghalaya2.jpg/1920px-Living_root_bridges%2C_Nongriat_village%2C_Meghalaya2.jpg)
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