How to grow a Royal Poinciana bonsai from seed (Comment Reply)

Do you want to start a Royal Poinciana (Delonix Regia) bonsai from seed? 

This is probably the best way to create bonsai though it is the longest one and it needs a lot of dedication and time as well. You can control every aspect of the way a seedling grows and then you are going to enjoy the results. Time, patience and the fact that some knowledge and experience are needed tends to keep people away from attempting Bonsai work in such a fashion.  But in reality, Bonsai from seed is the purest form of Bonsai. 

One thing I have found when growing seedlings is that it is best to start with more than you think you will need. Not all will germinate, some will do better than others, any mistake will make you lose some of them, etc, etc.

If you are wanting to be successful at growing bonsai from seeds , the first thing you need to do is imitate the conditions that the poinciana has in the wildlife.

Young material needs to grow and not be held in check, nor should it be root pruned in order to restrict growth as this is counterproductive. New branches should be allowed to remain in order to fuel development of the trunk. They need to bulk up for a few years before they start getting trained. 

As your trees are very young, I would suggest planting them in very large pots for at least a couple of years to thicken up the trunk and give it a decently hard pruning every winter to aid in a compact growth habit. 

As for potting, the purpose of potting a bonsai is to keep it semi root bound in an attempt to keep it small.  But treat them like any other bonsai when trimming back the roots. I would suggest to do it when they start showing roots at the bottom of the pots and they are firm enough to lift the whole tree and soil out of the pot. 

Defoliation is done in the early to mid-summer. Don't repot your tree unless it needs to be repotted. If you need to do so, repot (and/or prune branches) in either late fall or late winter, when the tree is dormant and therefore not subject to any stress. 

Do not defoliate now because it willl happen naturally anyway as it does with deciduous trees, but by doing it yourself, it will be 'stimulated' to grow new leaves now, rather than more appropriately in late spring/early summer, and then will die because leaves can't survive the frost, etc. 

The Bonsai gets most of its nutrients from the actions of its caretaker. This means being a responsible plant owner and doing research on every species you keep. Fertilizer  is good in that as with all plants it helps growth, but it is bad in that too much will poison your plant. Bonsai need a good feeding program due to the fact that they are NOT grown in 'normal' soil. Bonsai soil is very coarse and contains only small amounts of nutrients itself. I would use any balanced plant food for now (10-10-10) I like to constantly feed my Bonsai by using a 1/4 dose liquid food (you can read more about how to choose a fertilizer in this post Fertilizer)

I have a couple of ideas of what you can do with so many young trees, because it is the right time to decide what you want to do with them, before it is too late.

Remember as I mentioned above, you need to be aware that not all your youngster will survive the high temperatures of the upcoming summer or the first winter as a "real tree", so you do not need to spend a lot of money in getting fancy bonsai pots...at least not for now.

First, you can put them all together in the same pot and you will be growing them in the bonsai style called "Group style or Yose-ue". It is not rocket science but you need to give them enough space between each other for them to grow independently instead of mixing their roots. Try to place the tallest one in the middle so you can arrange a "forest" like scene. It is a Japanese tradition to use Odd number of trees when growing a Yose-ue.

Your second option would be to grow them in a simple braided way. Again, the rule of  using only odd number counts for this style. Even though this simple style is not a recognized Bonsai style, you can still called it a "multiple trunk style" but in a modern and easiest way. A good advice is for you to peel about an inch or so of each tree's bark where they touch each other so in a couple of years you are going to have one conjoined tree. It sounds weird right? but yes...you can do that. 

And my final idea is for you to grow them in a Multiple Trunk Style. The difference between Multiple Trunk and Group Style is that in the first one, all the trunks are supposed to grow from the same tree, so you need to place their trunks together and their roots will mix. Instead of having 5, 7 or 9 trees, you are going to have 1 tree with 5, 7 or 9 trunks.

I hope you have found these ideas useful and like always, everyone is welcomed to share any other advice on this topic.