More about Bonsai: Grow a tiny tree

*Chinese Elm (c)  2006 National Bonsai Foundation

A fine example of bonsai in North America . The Chinese Elm  (Ulmus Parvifolia )  above is on  display at the U.S National Arboretum .  This elegant elegant Elm  has  been in training since 1956  !

 At Incoming Bytes one of my favourite past times  is playing with indigenous species and  attempting to grow bonsai--real trees that grow for many years in pots.  As a hobbyist I work with indigenous species simply because they are already acclimatized to our severe weather conditions.

There are dignified, elegant  old bonsai specimens that are many hundreds of years old in Japan and China. 
Fabulous specimens  like the Elm above also exist in North American displays . 
Here in Northwestern Ontario, I do not pretend to be able to immediately imitate the results of many decades and centuries of labour by dedicated bonsai specialists in China or Japan.  
We can, however, produce amazing results in a few years with patience and some learned techniques.  
 As hobbyists, realistically,  we may not have 400 years to train  little trees,  but with patience we can  can grow  presentable and very beautiful  bonsai using proven techniques that can be learned. 
The following article on creating your own Bonsai was published in Helium in 2007.  Enjoy!
Grow a tiny tree-create your own bonsai !

        This simple experimental bonsai discussion may change your mind, like growing things often do.  Ideas change with the learning process, so may it be here that you discover the spirit and joys of Bonsai, an ancient eastern art form that has spread throughout the world at an amazing rate, as people everywhere have discovered the incredible beauty and allure of these tiny trees. Bonsai can and most likely will affect your life.
They grow in your mind just as they grow in your environment.......read more...
                         

 *Here at Incoming Bytes we will be discussing some interesting ideas and methods of creating bonsai  in future posts .  
 *Is that incoming I hear?    
                       


 That's my story and I'm sticking to it


* Photograph  courtesy of the National Bonsai Foundation Supporting the National Bonsai & Penjing Museum at the U.S. National Arboretum 

Incoming 2 : Get out the Shades

The Age of Light is upon us  (Solar flares and all)

My genius friend  Terrence Aym ( Write on! )  always seems to inform us of the  most interesting stuff.   It's always something good.  

This time he's onto something big --yet again, and in a timely manner. As our loyal readers know, at Incoming Bytes  I'm always paying attention to see what IS incoming  so I can  just stare at it,  duck into the bunker,  or take evasive action.
 Guess what, today's the day there are supposed to be wicked geomagnetic storms. 
I wonder if it will warm up our -36C  (-32.8F)  and start the flowers blooming? 
Being January 21st we won't hold our breath, but maybe we'll get out some cool antique Elvis Presley shades for the show, nice polarized ones.
Why? Because on January 19th there was a huge solar flare, ---an M3-class -kaflooie -gesundheit  by the sun herself. 
 The old girl sneezed right at us.   We may catch something.
Here comes the disaster disruption apocalypse M3 class snot sun, it's all right, it's all right...as the old song goes.

Let's not worry about it.  If you want to read more about this epic event, courtesy of Terrence --who invariably and happily scoops us on all things scientific and interesting,  just click on the link he left  us:
http://www.space.com/14301-incoming-sun-fury-unleashed-earthbound.html

That was from www.space.com   which may be out in space.
 
If the link doesn't work, it might already be too late.  Just put on the coffee and read this article again to put in time.
  That oughta help distract us from our naturally-evolved state of fury and  worry.

Let's keep in mind this is all scientific  unbelievable hooey sun- stuff.  Do you believe in scientific  sun-stuff? 
No matter how it turns out, thanks, Terrence!

Is that Incoming I hear? 


That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

2012: Is that Incoming I hear?

The Age of Light is upon us...

 Incoming, --frozen solid, or moving in, one at a time?
New Year's Eve  is  a distant memory and January is more than half used up already. The unusually mild winter did a nasty to all January sun-lovers including us here at Incoming Bytes, changing  our freakish snow-laden banana-belt sauna-weather to a more realistic  and politically-correct Canadian January with dry, brutal cold.  It's almost enough to freeze your tongue to a steel pipe, don't you think so?
The garden and bonsai are stored snugly, cozy as can be under a blanket of snow. How lucky for them.   

 It is -33C  ( -27.4F)   today; --that is without any wind.    It was -25C yesterday with a vicious wind--yet in the unheated  sunny greenhouse it was an amazing 5C +(41F)   ...that's almost banana-land warm, sans beach  and iced tequila Sunrise.....imagine that.
Out in the "outerworld,", the real world, -- you know the quaint place where the REST of the world exists?   There are many things happening.
 Earthquakes. Flooding.  Famine.
 Strange underground noises, um....hums, buzzes and shake-ups  too.  Let's draw the  government-supplied  Roswellian window-shades. If we don't look, The truth is not out there. um....ok,,,,um...ok...ding-dong, you're wrong, The Age of Light is upon us....
Shifting earth crustal-bustals.  Tsunami, real Japan-movers.  North poles going south.   Islands rising in the sun just for fun.
 Solar and brain flares are disrupting  electronics, harmonics  and logic. What's that, you say?  Illogical, you say?   Haarp, the Harold angels Zing us with vapour trails delight;
 Political unrest, demonstrations  and nasty riots instead of  quiets.
 International tension-mentions of  nuclear threats, to  positing aircraft carriers in a genuine fear of war games and strange, apocalyptic  joy at the prospect of inevitable and uncontrollable war games.  Fill  the Strait of Hormuz with the crooked scorched bones of lunatics,  pave the parking lots with glass, shall we insist, resist or desist? Nuclear ready or not, here we come....
Totally insane, greedy leaders of itchy,  pseudo-religious miserable self-declared self-righteous countries acting  like they've been out in the sun far too long -because they have been out in the sun for far too long.  Invest, protest and re-test  for Collective, unsurpassed madness and profit in the radioactive Middle East Oil patch.   Hatch a new radioactive plan to do everything radioactively.  
Redefine  mutant civilization?  That’s fine. Drink Iodine.
Camp out, Occupy  this, economic recession to  big Depression,  dangerous repression of civil liberties world-wide.
Wikipedia blackouts?  Ugly SOPA-box....Legislated PIPA, vibes of Internet Big Brother sticking his nose in the business of scribes? 
   
Seems like a normal day to me.
But wait....what is really Incoming? 



that's my story and I'm sticking to it