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Bonsai is in a way like photography – it is possible to buy dozens of expensive ‘add-ons’ to the basic equipment. Some of these are helpful, others merely give you the feeling that ‘Gee, I’m really an artist’. Tools do not make the artist – the artist uses tools.

Though not essential, the following will nonetheless help you achieve a sculpted bonsai tree. They can make the difference between a ten second task and drudgery. They can also help you perform the task cleanly, without undue risk to the plant.

A folding saw is helpful when you have thicker branches to remove. Trying to remove these with a cutter can put excessive stress on the tree since it requires you to open up the jaws further than you can easily control.

When you open cutters further than about 60 degrees, unless you have very large hands, you will lose some control. Also, cutters are designed to grasp and snip the entire branch in one cut. If you have to make more than one cut, the tool is too small for the job. That results in cuts which are not clean and ragged wounds don’t heal as well as clean ones.

A root rake is used as an aid during re-potting. With it the bonsai artist can clear dirt and rocks from within the roots and comb out any tangled roots for easier trimming. Some novices will be inclined simply to shake the dirt out of the root ball, but this can easily lead to a broken tree.

Tweezers are a good supplement to the thumb and forefinger for pinching off dead or new growth, in order to refine the shape of foliage. Many designed for bonsai work have a small trowel at one end. The trowel can be used as a miniature shovel to compact earth, arrange ground cover and a myriad of other fine-level work.

Small scissors are helpful for another kind of detailed work – snipping off leaves and smaller branchlets where a larger tool would be cumbersome. That kind of ‘fine-tuning’ can make the difference between ‘done’ and ‘well finished’.

Beyond these there are dozens of specialized tools that make the work easier and many different styles of the basic and helpful tools. Jin pliers, for example, are used to strip bark and create deadwood for decoration. Branch benders are a set of clamps used to supplement wire work. Many different styles of gravers exist for carving work.

Grafting tape and cut paste are helpful for healing accidents introduced during trimming and wire work gone awry. Sharpeners come in all shapes and sizes for maintaining tools. Like photography, the list is endless.

But whatever you find helpful, buy quality. Quality counts. Good tools will last years and maintain a sharp edge when re-sharpened. Spend a little extra up-front and you’ll find yourself saving money in the long run and achieving better results on the work of art you spend so much time developing.

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The craft of shaping miniature trees in a small pot first arose over a thousand years ago in China, where it was known as pun-sai.

Even then the variety of individual bonsai was astonishing, as known from ancient drawings. Gnarled, faux-windswept trunks, with sparse leaves to full-flowering miniature blossoming trees dot the historic record.

The Chinese artists often went one step beyond nature and shaped their trees into replicas of real animals and imaginary icons. Native birds, mythical dragons and a host of tiny fauna formed the models for many of these fine sculptures.

As Zen Buddhism spread from China to Japan during the Kamakura period, so too did the art of bonsai. The late 12th century saw the migration of both artists and craft techniques to the small island in the northeast.

While bonsai was already a highly developed skill in China, as it grew in Japan it evolved into the highest of arts. The care and patience required, the complexity in miniature and the creation of a living work of art suited the temperament of the horticultural artists of Japan.

Planted first in the monasteries, the art of bonsai was practiced and refined by the learned scholars and cloistered artists of this rural society. This gentle art, requiring the skill of a jeweler and the patience of a saint, suited the monks well.

Developed to a peak during the 18th century, where they were frequently regarded as treasured objects by the nobility, bonsai rapidly became popular beyond the walls of the monastery and the palace.

As Japan grew from an agricultural society to an industrial and trading powerhouse in the 19th century an ironic historical twist occurred. The agricultural art of bonsai spread from the monasteries to the general populace.

As Japan, for centuries fiercely isolationist, opened up its ports and palaces to Westerners, the distinctive miniature trees drew the attention of awe-struck visitors. Nowhere before in their travels had seamen and ambassadors seen anything like these carefully crafted living things, so like their larger cousins.

Many adopted the practice of placing fine bonsai in a ‘tokonoma’ – a special niche in every Japanese home whose purpose is to display special ornaments and prized possessions. Among these was invariably a bonsai or two.

Museum exhibitions of bonsai in the Western world became popular at the same time as they began to display animals and artifacts from travels and conquests around the globe. In London, Vienna and Paris bonsai were all the rage. With the Paris World Exhibition in 1900, the future worldwide fame of these miniature trees was assured.

As with any popular phenomena, there grew pressure to mass produce bonsai to meet the demand for these unique living works of art. But bonsai resist mass production. Each must be carefully tended over decades to produce even a recognizable tree, much less a work of art.

But many new artists developed many new forms and this living art is now practiced and the products displayed around the globe. Bonsai are treasured in the US and Asia, but also around Europe, South Africa and Australia. Anywhere there is abundant sunshine can be found the bonsai.

The history of this unique form of art is hardly finished as the artisans continue to create new and ever more varied ways of shaping and displaying these glorious miniature trees.

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