Lately I’ve been interested in getting into bonsai trees. I’ve always thought it was an intriguing practice and I recently saw a few kits for sale on Amazon and I almost bought one. However I didn’t want to just go in blindly, so I googled about getting started with bonsai and it turns out starting with one of those kits isn’t a wise idea. They come with a seed, a planter, a small pot, and tools, what they don’t tell you is it five years or so until that seed grow into a tree that is ready for training. In other words you’ll have to wait forever before you can actually use any of the tools it comes with.
Turns out a much better (and traditional) way to begin is to get a cutting at nursery, that way you won’t have to wait to long to train it. All of the sites I looked at also recommended getting involved with a local bonsai club to learn the best tree species for beginners in your area’s environment and the best nearby place to get a cutting. I found a club in my area and I’ll be leaving for the meeting in an hour.
D.J. Garcia, Gentleman & Scholar 