Is this an Acer palmatum kiyohime ?

Discussion in 'Maples' started by Andre, Mar 31, 2005.

  1. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    I bought this tree today and I'm not sure this is a kiyohime.

    What do you think ?

    Thank you
    Andre
     

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  2. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    In fact, here are my 2 japanese maples.

    On the left, it's supposed to be a palmatum palmatum and on the right a palmatum kiyohime.

    What would you say ?
     

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  3. yesheh

    yesheh Member

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    my vote is that it is a palmadum kiyohime, after comparing the two pictures; i've been root pruning palmadum seedlings off and on all day...
     
  4. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Are you working in a tree nursery ? In which country ?
     
  5. mr.shep

    mr.shep Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    From my vantage point, sometimes a photo just of the leaves
    is not adequate enough to make a determination as to whether
    the Maple is what we bought it as being. I think for this Maple
    we may need to see a photo of the entire plant to be better know
    if you have a Kiyohime or not. If we see an upright growing
    tree instead rather than see a mounding or spreading tree then
    we may have some suspicions that the tree is not a Kiyohime
    at all.

    Based on leaf shape so far the leaves looks right for Kiyohime
    but let's have a better idea of what you have.

    Jim
     
  6. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Here is the tree.

    One told me thant kiyohime's trunk are white grey and this one is green so ...

    Thank you for your help !
     

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  7. mr.shep

    mr.shep Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    Hi Andre:

    Do you know where this Maple originally came from?
    How long has this Maple been in that pot?

    Obviously, it is a very nice Maple and there are lots of
    people that are more familiar with bonsai Kiyohime than
    I am but from what I am seeing the leaves are too large
    in size considering the age of this plant. I could be wrong
    but the bonsai Kiyohimes that I have seen have much smaller
    leaves but in most cases those Maples had been in the same
    pots for a few years also. The leaves can scale down in size
    to almost thumbnail size once the Maple has been trained to
    fit in the shallow pot for any real length of time. It could be
    that I am much more used to the Japanese forms of Kiyohime
    rather than the European forms of this Maple but for now I
    cannot say with certainty your Maple is a Kiyohime based on
    the size of the leaves alone. The basic shape of the leaves is
    right however for Kiyohime and a few more Japanese Maples.
    The whitish cast color on the green trunk seems like a valid
    point also as I even checked my three forms here and the
    bark color of my Maples are not nearly as pronounced a green
    in color as yours is but that could be due to our different
    environmental conditions from where you are located and
    where I am.

    You may want another opinion and I suggest you get a few
    more opinions other than mine should the authenticity of
    this Maple be in question. It could be a Tamahime instead
    but even still I would think the leaves would be smaller in
    size also considering the age of the Maple.

    Jim
     
  8. yesheh

    yesheh Member

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    yeah, just over spring break, in canada, check out our magnolia arboretum though at www.flickr.com/photos/yesheh. we have about 160 magnolias here, and it's sort of that time of the yeah. when we get to maples, there will definitly be photos too...
     
  9. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Unfortunately I don't.

    Tamahime has red petiole. Mine are green.

    I will check the vertrees's book and let you know if I find some more informations on my tree.

    Thank you anyway ;-)
     
  10. mr.shep

    mr.shep Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    Tamahime has red petiole. Mine are green.

    What makes you think that Kiyohime does not
    have a reddish colored petiole most of the year
    just like Tamahime has and then both petioles
    will later turn green on the older growth or in
    growth grown in lots of shade?

    Tamahime and Kiyohime have the same basic size
    and shape of the leaves. Tamahime will have their
    leaves turn a little darker green starting in mid to
    late Spring than all of the forms of Kiyohime will.
    It is the growth habits that separate these two Maples
    more than anything. If you look around these Maple
    forums you will see the akame form of our Kiyohime.
    Notice that growth habit of a low growing, not
    mounding yet spreading Maple. Tamahime is more
    of an upright grower and will mound just like your
    plant shows. Based just on the growth habit your
    Maple is much closer to being a Tamahime in nature
    than any form of Kiyohime that I know of, although
    Murasaki kiyohime can grow the tallest of the forms
    of Kiyohime that I know of. Even still, the size of
    the leaves on our Kiyohime and Tamahime in the
    ground and grown in containers are smaller in size
    than your Maple is as a bonsai. What's wrong with
    that picture? You asked if your Maple was a Kiyohime
    and I made comment to that. Based on the leaf size
    alone your Maple is neither a form of Kiyohime,
    nor is it a or Tamahime either all things being
    equal. By the way, I’ve seen Maples grown in the
    ground and have been sold as bonsai once the roots
    were severely pruned to fit the plant into the shallow
    bonsai pot and with some selective trimming of the
    top growth made the plant faked enough to become
    saleable as a bonsai plant to the novice, prospective
    buyer. If you knew your Maple was not a Kiyohime
    then why did you start a thread asking if your Maple
    was a Kiyohime or not?

    Jim
     
  11. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    You're right so that proves that mine is not a kiyohime either.

    Because when I bought it, the label shows "Acer palmatum kiyohime" but when I checked the vertree's book, I find it too different from the picture in the book.

    I didn't find the akame form of Kiyohime in the forum. Can you tell me more about this ? What means akame ?

    Thank you

    Andre
     
  12. mr.shep

    mr.shep Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    Hi Andre:

    None of this is easy to learn. The books do not tell us
    what to expect of these plants from the time they leaf
    out to the time they drop their leaves. We see a pic in
    a book and have to equate it with a Maple that we have
    or have seen and we try to made a comparison of that
    digital or camera photo with our plant. The problem is
    that even the book picture may not always correspond
    to our plant, yet the plant depicted in the book is the
    same as ours. No one talks or has written about the
    stages the plants go through in a growing season so
    we either have to rely on people that know these
    things or depend on others that have grown them to
    help us.

    I understand and have made comment more than once
    in this forum about Maples that have a named tag for
    selling purposes that is not the correct name of the
    Maple at all. I wish it were not true but it has become
    more rampant now than when I was buying Maples to
    grow on that today the name on the label to me has no
    meaning. We have to know what the Maple is before
    we buy it or we will have to figure out what the Maple
    is later or have help in doing it as chances are the labels
    are going to be wrong more often now than they were
    10 - 20 years ago. I've seen online several attempts to
    fool people into believing a particular plant is a bonsai
    specimen when to me it is not a bonsai plant yet. I bought
    two Maples last year that were pre-bonsai in that they were
    grown in five gallon containers, had their roots pruned,
    their tops thinned and then were placed in bonsai pots
    for less than a month to be sold as genuine bonsai to me.
    I have no desire for bonsai as I do not know who to trust.
    Actually I do know but I am not about to pay $450 for a
    Maple that I can buy the same conventionally grown plant
    for $149 for, so I told the seller if he wants to sell me those
    two Maples he had better take them out of the bonsai pots
    and place them back in five gallon containers, give me a
    five gallon price or he can sell the Maples to someone else.
    Well, they came to me but the question I always had was
    would he have sold those two Maples as bonsai at his
    nursery when he knew they were only less than a month
    in their new pots and never were a bonsai Maple? It does
    make one wonder.

    I do not fault you at all for wanting to know what you
    have but I think I have in a way addressed why I wanted
    to know how long this Maple has been in the bonsai
    pot. It could still be a Kiyohime but I cannot be
    sure of that until the plant gives me some indication
    that it is. Just because a book says that a plant has
    a red petiole means nothing to me. The books are
    adept at what they do not tell us and that is when the
    petioles are red and for how long. Are they red
    grown in full sun and are they red grown in high
    shade? From my experience the petiole color can
    change on us as the petiole on the leaf ages and the
    color and the sustained color of the petiole is affected
    by sunlight and the lack thereof.

    I am not sure of what you have either. I will have
    to see this Maple over time to help you out as I would
    want to know what the leaves look like in the Spring,
    late Spring - early Summer, Summer, early Fall and
    late Fall. Once I can get to know the coloring of the
    leaves, then we will see if the leaves shrink down or not.
    I may not have been around bonsai Maples much but I
    have been around bonsai Goyo, Akamatsu and Kuromatsu
    Pines whereby the needles on an Adcock's Dwarf or a
    Gyoku sho hime can become so small in length that they
    are only less than ½ inch long. I've seen Toichi Domoto's
    Cork Bark Kuromatsu have their needles that same basic
    length or just a tad longer also when the needles otherwise
    on those Pines grown in the ground would be roughly 2 ½-
    3 inches or more in length. Don Kleim had a Kuromatsu
    Arakawa sho planted in a concrete horse water trough for
    over 40 years and those needles were no longer than ½ inch
    long.

    I do not want to assume your Mable is not a bonsai but I
    have to as it may not have been in the pot nearly as long
    as it may seem. Then again, it may have been in smaller
    pots prior to this one but is not a Kiyohime but another
    Japanese Maple instead. We are trying to make sense of
    a situation that a comment was spoken to me yesterday
    when I tried to explain why I wrote what I did to you and
    that to her "somewhere there is a rat in Denmark". Well
    put!.

    Here are links to some Japanese forms of Kiyohime.

    http://ganshuku.cool.ne.jp/23_2kiyohime.html

    http://ganshuku.cool.ne.jp/23_2kiyohimeakame.html

    http://ganshuku.cool.ne.jp/23_2koikiyohime.html

    http://ganshuku.cool.ne.jp/23_3murasakikiyohime.html

    Jim
     
  13. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Hi Jim,

    Thank you for your long answer and the great links (too bad I can't read japanese)

    I will post pictures regularly this year and I think we'll find out the correct species name by the end of this year.

    Andre
     
  14. Layne Uyeno

    Layne Uyeno Active Member 10 Years

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    Hi Andre,

    I have a Tamahime and the petioles come out reddish pink and fade to a light, bright green or will stay reddish if given enough sun exposure.

    I've learned photos can be deceiving as far as color goes, both in the books and online. This is due to the photo-chemical/digital process, paper material (glossy paper makes colors more saturated), lighting, color balance, etc.

    Based on what I see from your photos your tree doesn't remind me of Tamahime, but it could very well be. My Tamahime will leaf out a very bright yellow green edged in pinkish red (with reddish petioles). Looking at your photos it seems your leaves have a more brick red edge that a pinkish red.

    The photo of the leaves you've provided really don't tell me any thing other than the two leaves are different. For all intents and purposes they both could have come from Acer palmatum seedlings.

    Another Tamahime I am able to observe at a nursery where I work on the weekends gets more sun than mine. Every thing is the same but the leaves take on a *rougher* look and aren't as dark green as mine and the petioles remain red or stay red longer.

    About bonsai: I'm glad you're taking up the hobby, but like Jim related, don't think for a moment that some nurseries aren't motivated by greed, even if it's only a few hundred dollars, when it comes to selling *bonsai*. Bonsai are created by you, not bought at some nursery. Haruo Kaneshiro's and John Naka's bonsai in the National Aboretum in Washington, DC weren't bought at some nursery!

    Simply pruning a tree and sticking it in a fancy clay pot is not bonsai. My father has been studying bonsai all my life (40yrs +), all that time under the teachings of the late sensei Kaneshiro. When I was a boy I remember my father's friend trying to convince him that they could make a lot of money selling bonsai. My father would train the trees and his friend would sell them for hundreds of dollars in a store. My father adamantly refused. That effectively ended their relationship. Back then I didn't understand, but I do now. Some people who are novices or ignorant about bonsai buy a bonsai tree thinking they're buying a painting. What happens to a painting after it's bought? Nothing. What happens to a bonsai after it's bought? It grows....new leaves, new branches, new roots. If the person who bought the bonsai doesn't know how to properly care for it it won't be bonsai much longer!

    Like Jim I have seen people take a $30 tree in a 1 or 2 gallon pot, trim it up a bit, *maybe* wrap some wire around the branches, stick it in a cheap bonsai pot, call it "bonsai" and sell it for $100 or more. Ludicrous.

    I digress as I'm getting off topic. In any case you have a very nice tree there (Kiyohime or not) and it has excellent potential to be a really nice bonsai. When I have a chance I'll post some pics of my Tamahime's newly sprouted leaves and leaves that have faded to green for you to compare with.

    Regards,

    Layne
     
  15. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Hi Layne,

    Thank you for the information but I know about the greed of some shops which seems to be the same in USA and in France.
    But I only pay 45 USD for this tree including the pot and even if it's not the best tree ever, I think that could be a nice bonsaï in ten years.

    You're right but I'm trying to improve my knowledge of bonsaï every day specially by writing articles for a bonsai online encyclopedia (in French sorry !)
    http://www.parlonsbonsai.com/encyclopedie/index.php/Accueil

    Thank you very much for your help. I'll be happy to see your pictures.

    Andre
     
  16. mr.shep

    mr.shep Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    I think the term pre-bonsai works best in this case. Bonsai
    refers to hands on training over time or the ability to force
    a change in the behavior of the plant such as the scaling
    down the size of the leaves or needles or to make the
    plant grow in ways that it would not ordinarily do. The
    true bonsai enthusiasts do indeed think of their plants
    as being self created or physically induced art forms.
    A living "painting" to many in reference to Layne's post.

    The price you paid for your tree was by no measure an
    attempt to fool or gouge like some plants I've seen online,
    at some nurseries and elsewhere. I've seen the same size
    Maple you bought sell for 10 times what you paid to
    the unsuspecting buyers in the past. Now, the rest is up
    to you as you have a nice Maple to continue on whether
    you leave it alone or do whatever you please with making
    changes in the growth or the shape of your Maple. For
    a pre-bonsai, starter Maple you did very well. Now, we
    wait and see what Maple you have and it can take up to
    2 years before we will have a better sense of the name of
    it if this Maple has a name.

    Jim
     
  17. Layne Uyeno

    Layne Uyeno Active Member 10 Years

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    Hi Andre,

    Here are some pics of my Tamahime. The first pics shows the new leaves and their edge coloring. The pics is a bit underexposed and so the leaves don't look as bright yellow green as they normally would, however the pink-red edging is pretty much accurate. It's not as dark as the leaf in your pic.

    The second pic shows various leaves in different shades as they fade from the first opening colors to the medium green the tree is known for. Notice how the new leaves at the tip of the branch still have pinkish petioles whereas the older leaves have bright yellow green petioles.

    The third pic shows the cute, tiny Tamahime leaves in relation to the leaves of an Umegae I have that has just started leafing out about two weeks ago.

    Layne
     

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  18. Andre

    Andre Active Member Maple Society 10 Years

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    Unfortunately that tree was sick.

    When I pruned the roots I have seen a little black spot at the cambium level and one month later here's what I have.

    What is the name of this disease ?
     

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