By In my collection of trees I have tropical and subtropical trees along with the standard California mix. The Peruvian Pepper is one of those special trees. I have been working on a little stump I found at the Sumagawa Nursery near Santa Rosa, CA. It was in a large container in a forsaken section of the the nursery grounds. I live around them and was interested in finding a tree I could attempt to train as a bonsai. Over the years I have found that it develops heavy tubular roots with very will on them. So cutting the roots had to be done carefully as to not lose a section of branches in the canopy.
The pepper is re-potted in the summer like most of the rest of the subtropical species I have. Today, was the day. I am always surprised by the amount of roots it creates. There were lots of fine roots this time so I could cut away some of the larger tubular roots. I cut back the foliage and started the process. The trunk itself is very wide but not very tall and this presents a design challenge. I am working to create branch ramification but that is a very slow process. I am having some success. I have left a longer growing apex branch to attempt a stronger central line for the tree. However in a month or so I will reduce it again and try for some branching. I have had to use a great number of sacrifice branches over the years.
artsofjc 