The Jesus Christ Bonsai

Join me for my new Bonsai forest project - a European Olive Forest planted on a Rock Slab depicting the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

This is Part 1 of a many years long project - In this video I'll be attaching the olive trees to the rock slab, securing them with wire, using muck/mud to hold the edges and soil in place, and then decorating the slab with small cold-hardy succulents like Sedum, Sempervirens and Ice plants. I added course sand as a top dressing and pressed it into the mud on the sides to create a more natural looking landscape scene.

As always, I threw the project together on the fly based on an initial concept so I only had a rough idea of how the final product would turn out. The next steps for this bonsai forest will be to thicken the trunks, grow and prune the branches to encourage back-budding and create foliage pads, and keep working on minor adjustments with the accent plants to keep this slab from becoming too over-grown as it's supposed to have a more desert vibe since it's based on the geographic region from the bible.

00:00 - Intro
00:23 - How I got the Idea
01:04 - Basic Outline & Materials for the Project
04:34 - Working on the Roots of the Olive Trees
08:04 - Attaching Trees to the Rock Slab
10:13 - Adding Accent Plants
13:49 - Trimming the Olive Trees
14:34 - Crucifixion of Jesus Christ
14:55 - Final Result
15:19 - Varg Vikernes