Journal April 12, 2013

The above photo shows the Arbequina olive seedling on November 6, 2012 and again on April 11, 2013.  It has been written that olives grow slowly when container grown, however, I am not finding that to be the case at all.

The Arbequina and Manzanillo varieties both fruit early, so I am forcing two years growth into one year to speed the process along.  All of the olive trees received in the fall did not get a winter rest period, but were grown indoors throughout the winter.  I do intend to give them a cold period of a few hundred hours this fall and then bring them in and start the forcing process again.

Someone asked if I planned on growing the trees as bonsai, and my response was no; but using bonsai techniques I intend to limit the size of the trees.

My goal is to  have the trees produce olives, and though olives make excellent bonsai candidates, to produce olives the trees require periodic branch pruning, which is not consistent with bonsai shaping.

 Using bonsai wiring for shaping young trees to allow better light penetration is very helpful though, as seen in this Mission olive seedling.