bonsaiTALK 2006 Article Contest

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A Hobbit Trayscape
by Treebeard - 1st Place
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The woodwork.

I have a box full of bits and pieces I have collected over the years, little bits of wood, unusual pebbles, trunk-chop remains and so on. I was able to find some pieces of old fence panel that had a very fine well-weathered grain, just perfect for a Hobbit’s front door. I also had some strips of dark brown Meranti which turned out to be just right for the fence.

figure 9

figure 10
The door construction was quite simple. Miniature planks were made, with the edges beveled and sanded. The planks were laid upside down on the table, more strips were stapled to the back, and the door was cut to shape and sanded (figure 9). A coat of green waterproof Cuprinol Garden Shades was then applied (figure 10), so that the door would not warp and split in the wet conditions it would be subject to.

figure 11

figure 12

The fence construction also proved very simple, but it did take quite a bit of experimenting with different methods and materials before I had something I was happy with. Strips of the Meranti wood were split with a knife and wound together with anodised aluminium wire. Figure 11 shows the different stages, including full strip, cut-to-length, split paling and wired together. Figure 12 shows the construction method. Before assembly the strips were given a coat of diluted dark wood stain to take away the freshly-cut look, and the wire was aged by rubbing it with wire wool.

The tree.

figure 13

The tree I decided to use for this project is a Cork-bark Chinese Elm, Ulmus Pafviflora. Some of the cork had been removed from the lower trunk sometime in the past, giving the tree a 'muscular' look. With what I had in mind for the positioning of the door, I had a choice of two fronts. In the end I chose what had been the back of the tree (Figure 13) as the new front because the doorframe would fit nicely into the curved section to the left. The branches on this tree are very brittle, two on the lower right have been lost, they snapped off when I tried to guy wire them down. A third branch, towards the front in this photo, snapped two-thirds of the way through when I tried to lower it. I was able to save this one, I closed up the break and covered it with cut paste, and wired it securely in position. After a few months it had repaired itself.

figure 14

figure 15

When I acquired the tree there were several scars on it from heavy pruning operations. Not long after I bought it I carved a shari in the side of this tree. There was quite a large scar near the top of the trunk and a smaller one low down. I removed the bark between the two, carved a channel into the wood just inside the living bark, covered the edges with cut paste and left it alone. After two years ((figure 14) the edges had callused over nicely. Not long after I did the original work I had decided that I would like to hollow out the trunk. What with one thing and another, I never got round to it. So when this tree got picked out for this project I decided to get started. The work was done with a dremel, using various small carving bits, figure 15 shows the work part-finished. The carving up to this part-finished stage took approximately 3 hours, I had to be very careful not to spoil the rolled callus that had formed at the edges.

figure 16

figure 17

Whenever people view my bonsai they will often pick this one as a favourite. It has had very little wiring done on it since I have had it, and I think that to people who do not grow bonsai it looks very natural. Conscious of this, I started wiring. I didn't want to spoil the wild look, but at the same time I realised that I would not be acceptable leave it as it was. Figure 16 shows quite a few straight twigs, but with an overall good radial spread. Figure 17 shows some wired twigs, some have been bent to shape and some have not. At this stage all I wanted to do was fill in a few empty areas and lower some of the bottom branches, with the rest of the positioning to be done later on.
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