Mame: SBBK Mar

Eric Schrader

  • Mame (up to about 3” tall)

  • Catlin Elm—1” base

  • Kishu Juniper—

  • Large rectangular pot with drainage, smaller lava or akadama fines—nestle mame pots in them.  Letting escape roots grow into the lower soil—don’t let it get too dry and not too hot 

  • Inspect once a month and trim escape roots

  • Can have moss in the tray but it can get out of control

  • If too many roots or matured, may block drainage hole—may not last until repotting season

  • Tends to repot once a year—main goal is to clear up the drainage hole

  • Pines are challenging because they don’t like too much water, but a small pot does not supply much water.

  • Cotoneaster are susceptible to scale (black bump, small white, green bumps)—lady bugs help or pinch them out. Tiny white ones can be toothbrushed off.

  • Normal Japanese Maples are challenging as mame.  Dwarf varieties are best—kotohime. Cuttings.

  • Typically 70% Perlite, 30% Coco Coir (but he is moving towards bark fines)

  • Uses Aoki Shohin soil (or Akadama)

  • Propagation—let them root first, then add bends (adds stress). Leave it for a year, then transplant and wire and root prune

  • Shade, bottom heat (seedling heat mats).  Juniper propagated in Oct.

  • Top growth mirrors root growth—if you see budding & growth, good sign.

  • Cotoneaster (spring cuttings): after pencil thick with movement, prunes hard and allows foliage to grow tighter.

  • Shari or Jin deadwood

  • Cotoneaster behaves like junipers when wired.  Healthy foliage.

  • Likes 16ga copper wire, very fine

  • Cotoneaster may grow a coarse pruned tip—so if you prune to the final silhouette it may look coarse.  So cut back a tad shorter and let a new finer tip extend to the silhouette of the foliage.

Raffle

  • 6” round shallow blue pot

  • 3” rectangular pot

  • Oak sapling

  • Japanese Privet (lingstrum)

Purchased

  • Juniper Shimpaku Kishu, mame size (for training and propagation)

Michael Wei