Bonsai For Christmas? Not A Great Idea.

I've written and rewritten this little essay for various mailing lists, newsgroups, and bonsai forums for the last 10 years or so. It's your turn. :rant:

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Bonsai - For Christmas?

Knowing that I grow bonsai, people often ask me about giving someone a little tree for Christmas. I tell them that, generally, it's not a good idea. In fact, often the worst thing you can give an unsuspecting friend as a Holiday gift is an already potted and designed bonsai. And you should never surprise someone with a tiny tree if that someone has never grown a bonsai -- or worse, has never grown anything.

Why such a hard-line against bonsai for the gift-giving season? Sad experience. I have participated with several internet discussion groups over the years. Without fail, a few weeks to a month after the Holidays, we get questions from clueless recipients of new bonsai about withered leaves or brown needles.

Almost always, these are first trees. Too often, it was their first potted plant! And with rare exception, there is little we can do for them;they wait too long to send us their cry for help.

Usually,what they'd been given were mass-produced bonsai (often a small juniper) shipped to shopping mall garden centers in semi-trailer loads,or ordered from the Internet, or from catalogs. A diagnostic mark of these mass-produced bonsai is that the surface of the pot is covered with pebbles or other stones that are glued on. This makes watering difficult. We call these potted plants, "Mallsai."

If their expressions of grief and sorrow are any indication, these dead or dieing trees cause their new owners to feel guilty or like they were failures of some kind -- and the close the relationship between giver and receiver, the worse these feelings are.

But usually,it isn't the new owner's fault that their bonsai dies; the trees they were given were already dead upon arrival at the store or at the giver's home-- from improper watering (the glued-on stones); shipping (the long,dark, dry trip from where they were potted); or simply inept potting to begin with. Especially with needled evergreens like juniper, it's hard to tell when the sap stops flowing; remember how your cut Christmas tree stays green weeks, or even months after it is harvested.

A possible exception to the warning about bonsai as gifts is if the tree is from a local merchant who pots up his own trees and who can help the new owner with problems. However, many local merchants also advise against buying someone a tree if that someone is new to bonsai.

So what do you do if you think your friend might like a bonsai, or if you're being pestered by someone who wants a bonsai?

Buy them a book on bonsai (you can find a list of brief book reviews right here on the forum), and a gift certificate to one of your local nurseries. They can read the book, enjoy pictures of decent bonsai made from many different species of trees or shrubs, then they can visit the nursery, find a bonsai pot, and choose a plant to make their own little tree.

I also suggest a gift membership in a local Bonsai Society. Or, point them to The Bonsai Site Forum. It's free, and filled with many very helpful people -- but nothing beats belonging to a local club.

Jim Lewis

This post has been edited by jkl: 07 November 2009 - 04:00 PM
Reason for edit:: Edited malfunctioning spacebar and forum coding