I've seen those pictures on other posts, Al, and I can't help but wonder why so many of the fine roots were removed? And, more importantly, how does a novice know which fine roots can/should be removed? There were several reasons in this particular case. 1) has to do with how intimately I understand trees in the Ficus genus, but there were other considerations at the time.2) Because soils dry from the top down, large roots attached near the base of the trunk but not TO the base of the trunk are just plumbing that takes up space. Generally, there are few fine roots emanating from these large roots close to the surface because it's intermittently too dry for them to retain viability. If you're going to cut a large root with few or no fine roots attached to it, you might as well take it all the way back to the point where it won't need shortening again when it goes into a quality bonsai pot. 3) If you compare the foliage mass before/after it was pruned, you'll notice I removed probably a little more than 80% of top mass. Many have been quick to point to the conventional article of faith which unequivocally states the top of the tree shouldn't be pruned to "balance" the root to shoot ratio because you need food from the top growth to fuel root growth. It all sounds perfectly logical until you actually start doing real repots or trying to collect a tree from the wild (or the landscape) during summer. Regardless of what convention says, when you prune either the roots or canopy of a tree, the tree is going to self-balance its root to shoot ratio. When a nursery has a row of trees that have been planted out for years and a tree spade is brought in to lift and B&B them, they ALWAYS prune first. This essentially roughly balances the root to shoot ratio; and, while the B&B trees sit in a row at the nursery (or in a nursery can) they are balancing the root:shoot ratio FOR you. So, when you buy the tree, there is nothing to be done to balance the tree. However, if you struck a deal with a near neighbor to buy a beautiful tree from his back yard (because he's relocating?), you couldn't find a nursery who does transplants who would dig and transplant the tree w/o doing a hard pruning; this, because they KNOW that w/o balancing root:shoot mass (or defoliating), the tree will collapse; or at a minimum, shed entire branches critical to the tree's eye appeal. I said all that so I can say, if you find need to perform a hard root pruning, an equally hard pruning of the top will allow you to get away with more.

One more question... This might be in a be a silly thing to worry about, but is tap-cold water okay to use to bare-root the plant? The water that comes out of my garden hose is really very cold. It's a good question. Anecdotal observations abound re this topic, and everyone who's been growing for any length of time has been told that water should be at room temperature or you'll shock your plants or something equal to that tenet. One of my best bonsai buddies will not water his tropicals while indoors with cold water, though he happily waters them from the hose as soon as they're moved out in spring and water temp from the hose is in the 40sF. I've made it a mission to question every scientist I've encountered, if I think I might get an answer, if they can think of any reason plants should not be watered with cold water, such as what would come from a garden hose. No one has yet offered a reason not to.

I leave a hose attached to a hose bib all winter because the trees I over-winter in the cold garage need watering every fer weeks. Water drains from the hose because it's on a slope, but there is often ice in the hose when I begin watering. My tropicals (before I started using R/O water for irrigation) I keep indoors were watered with water straight from the basement tap when it was so cold it would be painful to put your hand in it; and, I always try to water at midday in summer when everything gets watered straight from the hose on the hottest to the coldest days. I have no trouble consistently maintaining all my trees in a very high state of vitality, so based on practical application, I can say I've never seen evidence it's harmful ...... and on really hot days, I can almost hear my plants sigh when a blast of cold water from the hose instantly lowers root temps from the 90s to the 70s or lower.

Specifically, it would be a very rare occasion were I to use anything other than cold water from the hose when I'm repotting. I do avoid hot water though - in part because of the chemicals that dissolve from the inner hose lining when water is hot, and in large part because root temps as low as 115* can be lethal. If water is too hot to handle, it's likely above killing high temp.

Al