Japanese maple bonsai trees are one of the most highly sought after forms of bonsai, as these highly decorative, ornamental trees have a striking appearance of red or purple, and have good branching that is often sought out for bonsai. When you are selecting your Japanese maple bonsai tree, there are several things that you will want to keep in mind.

First, the Japanese maple bonsai tree can be one of hundreds of different species of Japanese maple. Because of this, you will want to research the specific classes of trees and learn how they grow. Some maples are best suited for larger bonsai settings, with trunks of three to four inches that exclusively live outdoors. Others are more suitable for smaller bonsai. Typically, Japanese maple bonsai trees are best suited for mid range to larger bonsais with trunks ranging between one and four inches.

There are some disadvantages to using Japanese maple bonsai trees in your designs. In many of the trees, particularly landscape bonsai that live outdoors, it can take ten to twenty years to get the tree to the stage it is ready to be designed. This time frame can often turn people away from designing Japanese maple bonsai. However, there are other types of trees that you can tend to that have a shorter grow period, letting your Japanese maple mature until it is ready to be designed into the forms that you desire.

If you are planning to work with dwarf Japanese maple bonsai trees, you will need to learn leaf trimming and pruning techniques to ensure the proper growth and design of your maple. Unlike larger trees, dwarf Japanese maple bonsai are particularly sensitive to how they are trimmed. If you prune the wrong branches, you can negatively impact the growth of your plant. As the dwarf plants require more care than their larger counterparts, improper care can result in the shortened life span of your plant, or leaf sizes too large for your bonsai design. If your leaves or nodes grow in too large, you will not be able to correct this until the next growing season.

Japanese maple bonsai can live for hundreds of years with the proper care. Because of this, it is not uncommon to see these types of trees be passed down from generation to generation. If you own a Japanese maple bonsai tree, you will want to ensure that whomever will care for it next learns the proper care methods to ensure the lasting survival of the tree.