When you think this is the third week in October to have such wonderful weather, we do get it. It adds even more to the pleasure of seeing these beautiful, beautiful Maples, I’m just zooming in with my gimbal device, but I will now take a walk just to get some closer views of these beautiful colors.
It never ceases me how beautiful the things are. Every time I see it, it is always different. Just because this has been here for 36 years doesn’t mean that the views each year are exactly the same. There is always something different: the trees one tree can be yellow one year next year can be bright red and vice versa.
So, let’s begin our tour, so I will get up from my chair and walk around and, as always, I do apologize for the sound of the planes. This is something I have to live with, but when you get beautiful, sights like this plane, noise doesn’t worry me in the least.
So, let’s begin our tour, so that’s the room from which I emerged, which is our Zen meditation Hall. I do my rowing and my dancing in there my movement practice as I call it. That’S the best thing I ever built.
What a beautiful day look at the sky. You don’t have to go anywhere else to get this beauty. I think in every country every place you will always find beauty. You only have to look for it. People always say to me: why don’t you come here? Come there you’ll see some beautiful sights.
We have beautiful sights here. I do enjoy going abroad, mind you, but the point I’m trying to make is that you find beauty in whatever you look at, so I’m just standing still, because the view is absolutely Exquisite, almost divine.
So let’s take our walk. My voice might sound a bit Gruff because I had a cold the last few days, the maples that grow in the flower pots have almost all lost, their leaves. Look at these leaves. These are the Palmetto, not parietum.
This is japonicum leaves or peacock’s Tails. This was a tree from Japan, it’s the deception that we grow, and this is an arakawa in a big pot. These have been grown from Airline, believe it or not, we’re going to silent that tree.
It’S a little bit ten foot tall and the trunk is about six inches in diameter. My area, the tops to make multi-trump trees, Tokyo, multi-tron, trees, I’ll show you another specimenary color, which has been growing for Yorks here.
That was another comma look at the base. Sadly, the center trunk died, but it’s still a lot got a lot going for it, and my body must be about 18 inches across this is the HARP stream and the harp string.
Almost all the leaves have dried up and it’s finished some more mikujaku. Look at color those leaves look at the color. Oh my gosh exquisite. This is a liquid Umber, not a maple, very hard to make Bonsai, but I’m in the process of developing taper on this tree, but we’ll get there one day: [ Music ].
Another of the strange cheap one comes, if only comes out, these very large leaves and they’re, not so deeply incised in the end. So, let’s take some more walks I’ll, try and remember the names and tell you which Maple is which this is our great big Chinese Zone, not Chinese, I’m English! I do a video of it every year and that I will carve again because the split trunk has healed over over a period of years.
It was Hollow, but is healed up so much to show, but don’t want to confuse you. Otherwise, you won’t know where to look. This is a large ginkgo tree. It’S about, I would say, 50 to 60 foot tall. Yes at least 60 foot tall, maybe more, and it’s only just about to turn color here we have a great big sheet of plastic on the grass because we’re trying to collect the seeds of the white Beach as they dropped the seeds if they just drop on The grass we will never be able to see it.
So this is the purpose of this plastic sheet. Our white Beach carries seed every year, but we seldom get a chance to collect it in time and also the squirrel steal it look at the seeds here. Look at the beautiful seeds: oh gosh, [, Music, ], foreign [, Music ] View [, Music ].
Let me continue my walk. The grass is extremely wet. It’S almost soaking through my boots. This is another Vista that I don’t often get to see. It depends how the sun is shining. The sun is shining very low from the southwest, and this is the view I get.
This is our lodge giant redwood, which was planted only 31 years ago in 1991.. The trunk diameter is about 10 or 12 foot, and the tree is about 100 foot tall. Now this Maple in case you’re wondering what it is, is a Sango, Kaku or senkaki senkakis, don’t often turn red the best they ever turn is a beautiful orange color where it does get the sun.
It is slightly more yellow or orange than the bottom branches. So these branches lower down our green or lime green, the top – has more of a automatic color. The other trees here are zerkovas [, Music ].
I have planted Maples in little clumps. This is what we did when I made this pond in 1991. So that’s a clump of about five Maples which have matured, and that is a difference in there as well and in the Autumn the leaves of the Surfside have that chocolatey smell.
There are some strange Maples in here. This could well be a japonicum. I think it is the leaves are not like a palmatum, but just about waiting to collect the seeds. These are the seeds of that American Maple called Camberley [ Music ].
This tree is just loaded with seed, absolutely loaded with seed, but the Autumn color of the tree is not interesting. It’S a very uninteresting, yellow, color, not red, like the Japanese maple, but the seeds in the middle of summer, just after flowering, they have that beautiful, intense, pink color, which I may have shown you in one of my late evening walks in the early summer.
Or was it midsummer? That’S an ordinary palmatum of merchant. These are the four Scots pine Garden trees that I made. I didn’t prune them this year. I missed the chance, but I think it’s okay. For a while, and at this time of the year, we have mushrooms growing everywhere next year, we’re going to run a course about foraging.
But for those of you who, like forging you, know very well that unless you know your mushrooms don’t be tempted to collect it or eat it, you could kill yourself. So, just within one small area, you see that there’s some Maples which are orange and some are red.
This very rare one here is just an ordinary palmatum. What we call a mountain maple foreign, so the noise is extra loud. This is an arakawa or rough bark. Maple this tree has a eight to ten inch diameter trunk.
Look at it another white Beach. We have several white Beach, but this one doesn’t usually bear seed for some reason. I just the other one all planted as small Bonsai at one point see where the sun doesn’t shine on it.
The leaves are still green, [, Music ]. I didn’t have time this year to go foraging and collecting all these young Maple seedlings, which sprouted up on the ground, but I might leave them till next year, so this arakawa has yet to turn color.
I know because usually this gets a very, very intense red, extremely intense color, so we have some beauty yet to come. Those trees in the background are selkova. Sarata, Japanese Graybar Camp, not a maple.
The clone of that particular group of trees is quite different from these. Are covers that we used to import from Japan for bonsai the imported ones used to just tear a bright yellow in the Autumn, but this one these mind you about 80 foot trees.
They turn this beautiful red when you have intense heat in the summer. These are my poor figs and because we are not a Mediterranean country, they seldom get a chance to get ripe, so they will just be wasted just talking about the variation in Autumn color.
Now this is a tried maple. It’S a large tree that I’m trying to restyle and regrow again I planted it in the ground because the original leader of the street died that tree is two foot in diameter cross and a new Side branch has grown to become a leader and that thick branch, Which is three to four inches thick uh, it’s just developed in the last three years, but the whole tree is green and it produces shoots which are over two meters long each year.
So all this growth all this growth here, let me show you from a distance six to eight foot draw over two meter. Long are all this year’s growth. I have the heart to cut it, because I want to alien them to propagate as many trees as possible.
Tridents have become very expensive in Japan, so the more we can produce ourselves, the better it is more sustainable, as they say, [, Music, ] foreign. I thought I’d come out to take a few more shots of the Autumn color, because the weather’s been changing by the hour.
Just this morning we had torrential rain and everything was flooded and now the sun is shining bright. So, let’s take a quick tour to show you some of the Delights foreign [ Music ], I’ve made in only two years.
Two years ago it was a strangulated field-grown tree that had been grown in the flower pot and with a pickaxe and crowbar. You remember the video I took the girdling root out and converted into a bonsai, so all these branches have been developed in the last two years.
These are Japanese Hawthorne, which you don’t often see. Most of the Hawthorn you get in Europe are the critigus monogina, which has smaller fruit more in size leaves what we call the English Hawthorn, but these are Japanese Hawthorne.
Look at the right of color. I will probably grow them into larger pots to get them into trees that have larger trunks. I love the sun shining through. It gives a diff different sort of feel little plug for the nursery.
These are the hinoki Cypress which which we use for making into delightful small bonsais. Just a moment ago, Sun was shining brightly, and now the sun has gone in how things change so quick, the maples are still biting their time, the ones in the field.
This great big tree hasn’t started changing color this hasn’t started changing color either, so we still have a lot more color to come. This will be the last of the Autumn walks, so I’m going to space it over a few days just to capture the rich color.
I love this view: absolutely love it: foreign foreign, foreign, foreign, foreign, [, Music, ], foreign [, Music, ]. After this rain, there won’t be any leaves left. So let’s enjoy what it does: foreign foreign I’m walking around the nursery, because last night we had a heavy heavy storm and even after about 12 hours, the nursery is still flooded.
The whole Nursery was six inches under water, and it’s only now that I’ve been able to come out and walk around a little bit. But despite that, the whole place is covered in water when the trees have been blown over.
What a terrible night we’ve had. Needless to say, with all the strong wind and heavy rain, the bonsais have lost almost all their leaves looking bare and all in the space of one week, all my maple bonsais have lost their leaves, so things are changing fast.
The trees which grow in the ground. Don’T lose the leaves so fast. Some have this one has. This is a big disorder, but the other trees have not lost their leaves. This one certainly hasn’t lost their leaves.
So let me walk towards the pond in the garden so that big Maple hasn’t lost its leaves either. So this video has taken quite a few days to put together because I’ve been stringing it out so that I can see the changes of colors and how the leaves drop with the wind and with the onset of the autumn.
Let me come to the pond, and the pond is almost overflowing it’s above the butyl water line and my poor boat is flooded. Look at it that boat won’t take to the water. So this is the aftermath of the storm when you think that we had a drought in the summer, hardly any rain, and now we have too much rain.
Everything is blamed on climate change. I don’t know what to believe, but we’ve certainly had a stranger. It’S been either too wet to begin with. Then it came too dry too hot, and now it’s too wet again things are looking be draggled.
All I can show you are the leaves which are on the ground. This Maple in the front has lost the leaves. The nomura has lost half its sleeves, the Silver Birch are starting to lose their leaves, and this is my white Beach.
They still have some leaves on. We’Ve been collecting a lot of seed. We’Ve had a real bumper year for white beetseed, so there’s still some more seed to collect, and this is the ginkgo look at it. Look at that Ginkgo in all its splendor.
This is what the ginkgo has grown for. The beautiful beautiful golden leaves look at that, even with the leaves on the ground. There is so much Beauty, absolutely divine. You must be thinking, I’m mad.
Look at me out in the rain trying to capture a bit of autumn. We’Ve certainly had all sorts of weather. This year, extreme cold to begin with, then a very wet spring, then a very hot dry summer and now floods in the Autumn.
Look at it. It’S absolutely chipping it down. I don’t know whether you can make out the water is clear, but there is six inches of water on the ground, I’m walking around with an umbrella. So I’m not that mad, but look at it.
It’S absolutely horrendous. Absolutely horrendous foreign [ Applause ]! Look at it! Philosophically, if it was all dry plants would not grow, maybe it’s all hot plants would travel, but the rain is preparing the trees for next year and the water is going into the ground to replenish the rivers and the aquifiers saw the cycle of life goes on When you’re involved with nature, you realize what a lovely thing nature is: it sustains life it gives life.
So, although it may not be convenient for walking around the Garden, it is all part of life, so the autumn colors have still got to Peak [ Applause ]. It’S been a rather disappointing year because, although it has been so warm and hot, I would have expected the autumn colors to be more vibrant, but many of the maples are still not fully red this one.
For instance, it’s got a lot of green leaves on it. So such is life. I’Ve been compiling this video for quite a few weeks. Now it’s supposed to be a video about the late autumn and this is going to be part of the late Autumn, Walk with video, but it’s been going on for so long and we’ve had such a lot of varied.
Today is the 19th of November and I’ve been trying to make this video about the late Autumn. Scenery calling it The Late Autumn, Walk for quite a few weeks and we’ve had such a lot of strange and varied weather that I just know don’t know whether I’m coming or going I’m looking at these great big oak trees and it’s a sunny day today.
But there are clouds in the sky and it could rain at any time, but just to show you that on the 19th of November we still have all these oak trees, full of leaves the leaves haven’t fallen. My large trees are still yellow, so these leaves have not Fallen, and the maples have been doing some very strange things this year, I’ll walk out and show you what the different Maples look like.
While I’m passing by this is the first year we’ve had this bumper crop of Japanese Hawthorn, look at them beautiful, beautiful fruit, I’ve never known a Hawthorn that has such beautiful fruit. There is a Hawthorn called the cruise Gully.
I don’t know whether you’ve heard of it, but they have fruit like this, but this is certainly a very nice one. So while I’m at this part of the nursery, I will walk to the front of my house, because that’s where I have a large de Shojo Maple and that they show your mapu is still green again, while I’m passing by this is another crab apple.
All the fruit are still there, and this is what are my horn beans on it’s one of the few horn beams as Bonsai that haven’t lost their leaves. So, as I say, it’s been a very strange year, so, let’s walk by and show you some of the trees that we have.
We always had interesting trees on the nursery, so I was going to show you the the Shojo Maple this by the way is our new shed replaces the old Nissan hus the asbestos shed. So there is my discharger in front of my house.
It is absolutely green, not a single leaf has fallen, and yet some of the other Maples these are the seedling Maples that have grown around my water basin. This is full red, but look at that. They showed you absolutely green, absolutely green.
On the 19th of November, no sign of the leaves falling at all, I haven’t, leave pruned or anything, and it’s just behaving in the strange manner. So, as I said, this has been a very strange year. Let me now walk through the nursery to show you some of our Maples.
That tree is one of our large mountain Maples. On the other side of my house again, the color is very insipid. It hasn’t turned red. It has just turned that funny: yellowish orange color, so I’m now going to turn the camera off and walk elsewhere.
So I’m passing by our new shed many people tease me that this is one of my garages. It’S not it’s just a shed. The shell has been made and we’re fitting it out ourselves. So let’s walk back into the nursery whenever the sun shines.
It lifts the spirit. You don’t feel so depressed when the skies are gray and when it is raining, it really depresses you. So these are my Maple bonsai and they’ve lost every single leaf. Every single leaf Has Fallen.
These are our maple trees that one has lost, also sleeves that one has lost all its sleeves. This is a deshojo in a pot. This has lost his leaves that they show you in the ground hasn’t lost its sleeves.
This is a maple that I’ve imported from Japan. It came from Kyushu in Japan, and the color varies from year to year this year the color hasn’t been so good. None of my Maples growing in the ground have had good color.
This great big maple, which I’m always proud to say, has been left unproned. I call it my small leaf maple. These are very small and the leaves are small. This is starting to lose the leaves, but the color is just a yellow color.
How strange is that the other Maple, which I found very disappointing if I can use that word, is the arakawa or rough bark maple arakawa usually has the best Autumn color among all the Japanese maples, but this year the arakawa has been a very insipid orange color.
Let me walk into the Grove. Look at all these lovely leaves on the ground. The ground is just covered with maple leaves. This is my other color, and this year it has not had any good Autumn color at all.
Look at it. Some of the leaves are green. Some are pink. Most of these are yellow, so this is certainly a very disappointing. Look at that view. Look at that view. So, even though we don’t have vivid red colors, the differences between the green and the yellows and the Reds give it so much interest.
So that’s a positive way of looking at things soon it’ll be winter autumn leaves falling in the Wind soon the leaves will drop and fall asleep. This is a bench where we sit during the summer. Let’S walk off to another part of the nursery and show you some more Maples.
This is a cereal which is a cut leaf maple, but the Autumn color is quite interesting. This again is another arakawa, but the leaves are not red, not brilliant food. So you see the hurricane, but the color is not the Vivid red that one would normally associate with arakawa.
These Maples are just yellow and the leaves of all foreign they’re, usually bright red. So what I cannot understand is that, despite having such a lot of Hot Summer Sunshine and when you have Hot Summer Sunshine – usually the leaves are very red.
So it is a turn up for the books, meaning it breaks all the rules a year. When you expect the color of the maples to be good, doesn’t turn out so good that in the distance is a senkaki or Sango Kaku and Sango Kaku is a maple that seldom turns red at best they turn orange.
But this has just remained yellow in the distance there. This Maple in the foreground, this already Mountain Maple again the color is not brilliant, but most of the leaves are falling. That is nomura, which is the purple maple.
The leaves leaves stay purple or deep purple red all year and the summer color is this Vivid red, which reminds me there’s still so many seeds to collect. Look at these seeds crying out to be collected, nomura, that is it, and that is the stock of our plants from which we make our bonsai.
So it won’t be long before all the leaves have fallen and we will be into the depths of winter, and that is a mighty great big oak tree and that oak tree is still full of leaves almost green. Almost all greens [ Music ].
So I hope to end this video, I’m not sure if I will add to it, because I’ve been making this video for a very, very long while so, if I don’t add to it, I hope you’ve enjoyed what I’ve done so far, showing you the Autumn of 2022.