Yew Bonsai Progression (2017-Now)

In 2017 I air layered a branch off a full size Yew tree (Taxus Baccata) to start a bonsai with.

I still have this Yew and I will be going through its progression below.

If you want to watch it in video format, you can watch the YouTube playlist below. The videos show the progression every month through out the year, sort of like a time lapse.

Just be aware that some of my earlier videos are not the best quality, but just like my trees, they slowly improve over time, so stick with them and watch both get a little better as the playlist continues.

Yews are slow growing and the branch I managed to get was not great, so the progress on this tree so far is nothing amazing. I will be updating this page every year so you will hopefully find that as time goes on the tree gets better and better.

If you also have a yew and want more information about them, you can read my Yew Bonsai Care Guide

2017

Early 2017 I started an air layer from the large English Yew tree in my garden.  

After a few months it had rooted. I could see roots through the plastic, coming out of the sphagnum moss so the branch was removed the branch  and put in a pot.

I don’t have any photos of this.

The branch I removed was long. The air layer was quite close to the trunk, and then the branch went out for at least 2 metres, maybe even longer.

It was a low branch, just think and long, but as I said it was all I could really reach. The meant I had to chop it down a bit as you can’t really have a 2 metre tall tree. It is just going to be too unbalanced, let alone the fact that the new root ball is small, so supporting this amount of tree can be hard.  

I would estimate that it was about 50cm tall after I cut it down to size.

It was then left alone and just allowed to recover and establish itself in the pot.  

The other issue with the branch is that it really only has foliage on one side. The branch was growing horizontally, so the underside had no foliage.  When I put the tree vertical, it looks kind of strange. If you want the videos you will see what I mean. but wiring in a few years can fix that.

2018

I have no pictures from 2018 but It was again just left alone to recover and establish it’s self in the pot so it could build up some strength.

2019

My plan was to leave it alone again this year, but I had to move and basically I had two options. Leave it behind or reduce it in size so I could take it.

Here it is before the work.

As you can see there are a lot of little branches and I was just letting these grow over the last two years to get the tree strong and healthy.

And here is the aftermath of the reduction.

I really didn’t want to do this, but it was the only way I could keep the tree. It really set it back, but at least I still have it.

You can see it must have taken a knock in transport as now the tree is leaning off at an angle.  

The tree was now a lot shorter and the growth that was on it was very leggy so I started to do some actual work on.

I’ve also come to terms with the fact that I probably will not get much more thickness on this trunk. I wanted to leave this untouched for a number of years, but the house move changed that, so it is what it is.

I removed some of older needles and then a few weeks later trimming the new grow back, leaving about 6 pairs of needles in each area. This technique promotes back budding where I removed the old needles and you will not see the results until the following spring.

This process also starts ramifying the tree, but more importantly, make the foliage closer to the trunk thanks to the back buds.

2020

In the spring of 2020 I was enjoying the results of the back budding technique applied in July of 2019

Once the buds started to swell and almost open I repoted the tree.

Here are the roots. You can see they are decent, since the tree was started from an air layer.

After the repot the tree was allowed to recover for the rest of the year.

2021

In 2021 I pruned the tree in late winter. I was mostly removing a lot of extra foliage that was not needed. The area around the crown was particularly over corded and needed thinned out to make sure it didn’t get too thick or have any inverse taper.

In the summer I pruned it again to encourage more backing. I did the same technique as July 2019. I removed old needles then waited a week or so before cutting back the new growth. The results of this will be seen in spring 2022.  

2022

In late winter I did not prune anything, but I did wire or 3 or 4 branches. You can’t really see it in the pictures, but I wired a few down, that I would like to establish as future branches and also moved them around, so they would fill in some areas, mainly that side of the tree that has nothing growing on it.

There was not much growth during the 2022 season, but the tree remained helathy, which is all that matters.

2023

Not a lot happened in 2023. I did remove the wire that I had placed on some branches, but apart from that the tree was left alone.

I had planned to prune it in summer to get some back budding …but I forgot and then missed the window of opportunity. Annoying, but it allowed the tree to just grow, which i think it needed after last years lack of action.

There wasn’t much change, but yew is slow growing.

2024

My plan going forward is pretty much the same. I’m mostly leaving it alone, but I will prune it for more ramification this summer (if I actually remember) and we will see about a repot in 2024.

There is still a LONG way to go. I will update around the same time I release a new video on youtube.

In a few years it should look like the tree is a lot fuller in that area. I will also remove everything I did not wire at some point…maybe before spring. For now that extra foliage is helping keeping the tree healthy.

If you are not sure if these tree is worth my time, why not read – Is Yew A Good Tree For Bonsai?