This is a huge air layer that I started in May and finally separated in late September. I scouted this last October when collecting some Facebook marketplace yardmadori. The homeowner planned to remove this branch for pruning but I asked to try air layering it the following year. The caliper is probably 3-4”, and the length was probably more than 10 feet before I shortened it. And even now it is almost 8 feet.
The air layering steps are quickly shown in the photos, as well as my process of setting it up. I had to fit the whole thing in my Tesla Model X, and it barely fit…. Some might say it did not fit…
I got home late and had to finish in the dark. I removed a lot of big branches, potted it up in a big box I already had on hand, and secured it directly to my shade structure because I knew that if it was going to succeed at all, the one thing that it had to do was not move. Then I did even more thinning to reduce transpirational load.
A lot of the leaves shed, but because they actually went through a rapid color change, I felt like they weren’t completely dying of shock. And on top of that, a few leaves remain that are actually green, which wouldn’t be the case if it was dead.
Then, today I went out to find that buds had formed for next year. This is an amazing sign because it represents activity in the tree. We are still far from out of the woods, but I felt like this was far enough along to tell you all about it.
Provided it survives, I plan to give the lower trunk lots of light to stimulate growth of new branches. This has been deep in the shade for a long time. Then I plan to air layer the rest of it down over time to get half a dozen or a dozen more trees before I ultimately have my main chonky trunk, which hopefully will have low branches by then. If you look at the original attachment to the trunk, you can see that there’s going to be some nice low movement, though that is currently hidden under the soil for now.
Enjoy!
by VMey
7 Comments
massive! nicely done too
Hey, if you were able to get it from point A to B then it fit perfectly well in my book!
I did the same thing with a different species and is doing well, I saved me 5-10 years of trunk development
That’s awesome. Did you trim back foliage to reduce transpiration/water demand on the root system?
Nice work! Clean technique.
I might have set the air layer closer to the Y and treated the smaller branch as a sacrificial to layer off in a few years. Setting the layer right below the Y would have put the root flair just below the change of diameter, enhancing basal taper with movement just above.
I see your giant air layer, and raise you: [https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonsai/comments/1elos9v/update_giant_siberian_elm_air_layer/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonsai/comments/1elos9v/update_giant_siberian_elm_air_layer/)
You did the foil first then the plastic wrap on top of that?