Preparing for my Alaska Trip

I have not had much free time lately to take many photographs. I have been busy preparing for my trip to Alaska, and doing a lot of spring work on my bonsai and seedlings. So far only my Japanese Black Pine seedlings have germinated. I am concerned that my Japanese maple and Tamarack seeds have failed. I am still praying that they will germinate, but it is not looking good. I have also purchased two small Japanese Maples trees in the last couple of weeks. One is an “Orido Nishiki” Japanese maple and the other is an “Emperor One” Japanese maple. I re-potted them into slightly nicer pots with my bonsai soil mix. My plan is to let them grow vigorously for the next year and then decide what I want to do with them. My plan right now is to propagate them via air layering or soft cuttings that way I have more trees to work with. Also, then I will not have to start from seeds. Which takes substantially longer than starting from cuttings or air layering's. My biggest concern was leaving my trees during my trip. I really did not have anyone reliable to water them. So, I went to the store and purchased a water hose timer, and a sprinkler head. I tested the system last night and it seemed to work well for what I have. All the trees had adequate water from it. My only concern is that with fluctuating temperatures it is hard to judge how often they need to be watered while I’m away. So hopefully I will not overwater or underwater them. I do have someone to check on them in case the water system fails, but hopefully everything will be ok. I have no plans of using this system except while I am away.

Besides my trees taking up a lot of my time lately, I have been purchasing a lot of new equipment and necessities for my trip.  I will try and post about all the new equipment that I purchased, and I might review some of it after the trip.  I think Alaska will be able to put everything to the test.

Today I did take a trip out to the Bashakill.  I believe that I probably had a couple of usable photographs from the trip but I am not going to have the time to post them before I leave tomorrow.  Once I am back from Alaska in about 10 days I will do my best to post those photographs, and all the photographs from my trip.  I am really excited about this trip and I cannot wait to share all the photographs.  Until next time.