Japan's leading bonsai experts offer not only the basics for creating perfect bonsai, but also secret techniques the family has developed over generations of careful work and observation. It covers such skills as: taking a cutting for a new bonsai in winter while the plant still stores its winter nutrients, then wrapping and freezing the cutting until spring, when it will thrive; trimming branches in such a way as to eliminate swelling and scarring; the proper use of tools to ensure perfection...The book provides detailed, lucid information about growing bonsai from seedlings or beginner plants; expert advice on shaping, pruning, training, grafting and re-potting trees; and new techniques for using tools. The Kawasumi family is world-renowned for their bonsai tool design, and in this book they also show gardeners how to improvise with any readily-accessible bonsai tools, as well as gardening or even simple workshop tools. Step-by-step photographs accompany the text, many in full-colour.

Reviews

"Incorporating advice from his son, a tree doctor, the author teaches how to produce splendid specimens." -The Washington Post