by George Buehler

July is going to be a busy month - check the calendar and the President's corner for more information. The GLBS has events planned for several weekends this month. If you can only attend one, I would strongly recommend the Cass Bonsai Field trip. It will be a long day, but the Cass brothers are knowledgeable bonsai people, as well as Japanese Garden designers. They have a large variety of pots, tools, soils, Japanese Garden items, and of course lots of bonsai and pre-bonsai. One other thing, their prices are very reasonable and, although I haven't confirmed it, they often give nice discounts for field trips like this! Join us.

I attended the 2007 ABS Learning Seminar as both a Board of Director member and a participant in the learning seminar. John also attended to both take part in the seminar and to get an understanding of how the meeting works in anticipation of the 2011 seminar to be held in Louisville.

As mentioned a number of times, GLBS will be the sponsoring club for the 2011 ABS Learning Seminar. This will require a lot of help from all the members. I know 2011 seems a long way away, but a lot of preparation work will have to be done. Our president, John Callaway, will be setting up the various committees needed to run this type of seminar. When he makes the request for help, please volunteer. This will be the first chance for the GLBS to show the rest of the bonsai community both southern hospitality and how to run an efficient convention.

There is still the possibility that this seminar will be a joint convention with the ABS (American Bonsai Society) and the BCI (Bonsai Clubs International). If it is a joint meeting, there will be bonsai enthusiasts from around the world. We will keep you informed as we move closer to the date. Mark your calendar now for June 16-19, 2011.

On another note, the planning committee for the 2007 Virginia Beach seminar based their budget on 160 registrants. Unfortunately, there were not enough to meet the minimum requirements for the hotel contract. What does this have to do with the 2011 seminar? It means that our planning committees have to ensure that we have exciting and knowledgeable instructors, a good mix of vendors, and an efficient budget. In order to keep costs down and to show a profit for the meeting, we will need to have an abundance of items for the raffle, a lot of local sponsors, and most importantly, a large number of registrants from the GLBS. So plan ahead. As you go through your bonsai pots next spring, put aside those that you probably won't use, go through your book shelf and see if there are any books you can part with, and mark all these for the 2011 seminar. If you want them out of your way, give me a call and I will store them until our big event. Another thought is when you order a book for your library, why not order two - one for you and one for the raffle?

At this year's symposium, there were 10 instructors offering classes on a large variety of subjects. John and I took two classes on shohin shimpaku given by Suthin Sukosolvisit. The first was a presentation on what to look for in a good shohin and how to style shohin. In the second session, we worked on a shimpaku that Suthin had been preliminarily styling for a number of years. All of the trees looked quite nice before they were worked on. At the end of the session, I came home with another nice tree, although it still needs more wiring and development in a couple of areas.

It is interesting to note that the Japanese have now reduced the maximum height of a tree that could be called a shohin. The 'acceptable' height of a shohin has been reduced from 10 inches to 8 inches. However, Suthin stated that he does not wholeheartily agree with this size reduction and that the tree should be evaluated based on its character and style, not the absolute height. Even our US masters don't always agree with the Japanese. But this is what bonsai is about - the rules are not set in concrete and we can each have our own interpretations.

In Julian Adams' class, he talked about the positives and negatives of azaleas and how the Japanese develop the trees we think of as classical azaleas. Briefly, starting with a two year old azalea whip, they put the bends in the tree. Then over the next several years, they grow the tree out in order to obtain the wide girth in the trunk. He also talked about his philosophy of growing in Kanuma versus other types of soils as well as how to maintain the tree with fertilization and insect control.

A third thing to report on is the vendors. There were 9 vendors offering various bonsai needs. I obviously spent a number of hours in the vendor area (as usual) salivating over the bonsai items for sale. I used a lot of restraint and didn't purchase too much, only the things I really needed (or convinced my wife I really needed) like some wire, tools, a work table and another shohin tree. Most of the vendors were offering discounts to participants, especially on Sunday morning.

These learning seminars are not like the Brussel's Rendezvous. They are dedicated to teaching students new techniques and presenting growing ideas. As I always do, I came away with a large amount of growing tips and ideas, as well as three new bonsai and some nice purchases. The next seminar in is Texas in June 2008. Try to attend if you can, it is well worth the money.

I met a number of new "friends" at this meeting. When you start talking bonsai, they immediately become your friend no matter whether it was the first or fiftieth time you met them.

Many of you know that the Bonsai Today magazine has been merged with another magazine called Bonsai Europe. Bonsai Europe obviously was geared to the European bonsai enthusiast, while Bonsai Today was more pointed to North American bonsai enthusiasts. No one is certain what the merger will do for the NA bonsai enthusiasts. Will the editors move the entire magazine toward the European trends? It will be a wait and see situation. I'm not saying that the European bonsai ideas are bad, but a lot of the techniques used in Europe are not completely applicable to the North American climate differences. However, there is one magazine that is dedicated to the North American bonsai enthusiasts and that is the magazine produced by the American Bonsai Society. It is printed 4 times a year and contains articles and pictures dedicated to North America. It comes with membership to the American Bonsai Society and costs only $40.00 per year. I was really surprised to learn that there are only two GLBS members who are also ABS members. I belong to both the ABS and BCI (Bonsai Clubs International) and each puts out a magazine. The ABS journal is in color and prints articles on bonsai, while the BCI magazine is in black and white and appears to be moving more and more to suiseki (rock exhibiting). I'm not knocking the BCI - I'm just pointing out the difference. I know several GLBS members are BCI members, and I have set a personal goal of getting the same number of ABS memberships. Try it for a year and see if you don't like the articles and the quality of the ABS journal. You can register for membership on the web or give me a call and I will get you an application.