Page 14 - BSAM 2018 Q1

Top; View of bonsai exhibit and pot exhibit at the National Museum of Natural Science’s Oval Plaza.
Middle left; Left to right:
Dr. Giorgio Prosdocimi Gianquinto, Chairman, International Society for Horticultural Science Commission on Landscape and Urban Horticulture; Dr. Hsueh-Shih Lin, Chairman, Taiwan Society for Horticultural Science and Director, Taichung District Agricultural Research and Extension Station;
Dr. Sheng-Chung Huang, Taiwan Plant Conservation Foundation; and Dr. Hsin-Fu Yen, Associate Researcher, National Museum of Natural Science.
Middle right; Min-Hsuan Lo delivering his Oral Session presentation on his research on developing Ficus in the form evocative of the Banyan at the National Cheng Kung University grounds.
2017 International Symposium on
Bonsai
By Joe Grande, Canada
F
Hotel through downtown Taichung and the park-like grounds of the National Museum of Natural Science, led to a very special part of the conference, the 2017 International Symposium on Bonsai. In their welcome
letter, the organizing committee explained their motive for the symposium: To promote horticultural bonsai science, as well as facilitate an exchange of knowledge on a global scale. Home to a large and ever growing bonsai industry, Taiwan has all the resources and personnel to host such and event. e organizing and scienti c committees included representatives of the Taiwan Society for Horticultural Science; e National Museum of Natural Science; the National Bonsai Association of Taiwan; Horticulture and Landscape Department, National Taiwan University; Taiwan Plant Conservation Foundation; Department of Science and Technology, Council of Agriculture; and the International Society for Horticultural Science.
ey invited researchers, technicians and bonsai artists from all over the world to participate in a three-day symposium. The event was held at the National Museum of Natural Science, in Taichung, a modern facility with state-of-the-art lecture theatre, a large, Oval Plaza ringed with a portico—a perfect place for a bonsai exhibit—and a large main entrance hall where the live demonstrations were held.
On the morning of November 5, the symposium started with keynote speeches on The Impact of Climate on Bonsai Care in Eastern Europe and A Comparative Study of the Artistic Features of Chinese Penjing and Japanese Bonsai. At the same time, the big entrance hall hosted two demonstrations that lasted all morning and one demonstration in the a ernoon.
A er lunch, we heard country reports about the state of bonsai in the USA, Israel, Taiwan, Singapore, India and Japan. e report on Israel by Moshe Emergui was fascinating. Did you know that tree planting is a national passion in Israel? Moshe explained that
or convention participants curious about the scientific process in bonsai, a short and
pleasant ten-minute walk from the Splendor
“One of the great successes in Taiwan is that good bonsai can be created in 10 to 15 years if there is su cient knowledge, know-how and proper materials. The work is carried out by specialists in several stages.
Some start the cuttings for the rst stage of development, followed by others that cultivate the trees for fast growth and increase thickness.
In a third stage, the trees are grown as prebonsai to remove scars or improve primary and secondary branch structure. All this, before they reach the nal stage to become bonsai. To achieve this fast and e cient progress, each group uses speci c substrates, water amount, particular fertilization regimes and proper space. In most other places, bonsai people try to make all stages from beginning to the end, and this is not so e cient, as we tend to use more of a general mix for all. This results in a reduced growth and overall development that can have a signi cant delay up to 10 times slower progress. Excellent bonsai like those in the exhibit show additional character that develops slowly over time. The exhibition showed trees with more than 50 years of work.”
—Enrique Castaño, Mexico.
12 | BCI | January/February/March 2018