Saikei Deconstruction // Wiring

Regular readers may remember that way back in the deep, dark past (i.e. New Year's Day of this year) I created my first saikei. This is what it looked like when I first put it together.

This is what it looks like now:

The pickle plant really took to its environment, and grew steadily until it took over most of the pot. Perhaps I should introduce it to Crazy Potato! The Japanese Box just sat there looking surly for many months. I don't blame it really. I did cut off half the root ball after all. I finally noticed some new growth on it a few weeks ago, so I thought it was time for it to graduate to its own pot.

Prising the plants out of the pot. I don't know what all this white stuff is. ...Anyone?...
I decided not to take my gloves off halfway through like I normally do.

It was hard to separate the two plants. The roots were very entangled, but I think most of them belonged to the pickle plant.

I put the Box into its new pot first. It only just fitted but unfortunately I had no bigger pots, so this one would have to do for now. The mossy stuff that I'd dug out of the garden didn't fit, so I pulled it off and stuck it back in the garden where I'd originally found it. It'll be interesting to see if it survives.

I decided to re-pot the pickle plant back into the same pot, as I didn't have any other suitable ones. I left the weed traveller plant with it, as it was so entwined with the pickle plant and I didn't want to damage it trying to separate them. Plenty of 'pickles' were already falling off as it was!

Then I attempted to wire the Box plant.
Ergh. Unfortunately the average noob bonsai enthusiast doesn't get much of a chance to wire trees, and I drew a blank as I was sitting there. I also only had one roll of wire -- a fairly thick one -- so I only did the thicker branches.

The next day I had a change of heart and re-styled the branch on the left until it was nearly vertical again. I figure, if tree survives, I'll have plenty of time to correct any regrets later.