Mark Stephens said he dabbles in bonsai.

He’s been doing it for 25 years, but he only dabbles.

Stephens, 56, sits before a juniper bonsai tree, or “shimpaku.” It’s jagged and unkempt, the result of a season spent shaded by a wisteria plant. He has black framed glasses and a closely trimmed beard that runs red along jawline and fades into grey around his mouth. He runs his fingers along the branches, feeling for dieback, clipping away the dead branches.

Stephens is a member of the Evergreen Bonsai Club. They met Friday Jan. 16 at the Crossroads Neighborhood Church in Bremerton. About 25 members showed up to hear a lecture about repotting bonsai trees by John Conn, a local expert. Everyone is sitting side by side listening to Conn. Everyone except for Stephens, who’s in the back dabbling.

Make no mistake, Stephens is listening. He laughs the loudest and makes the most comments.

Stephens first became interested in bonsai as a kid after seeing an ad in the back of a comic book. He started in the mid-80s and then joined the Evergreen Bonsai Club in the early-90s.

He compares bonsai to a cartoon from the comic strip “For Better or Worse.”

“In one of the cartoon strips he went into a hobby shop and told the guy ‘I want a new hobby, I thought I’d get into trains’ and the guy said ‘My dear sir, model trains aren’t a hobby, they’re a way of life,’” Stephens said. “And that’s what I look like with bonsai too.”

Stephens lives in Poulsbo and works at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard as an engineer. He’s been there since 1987. Before that he was in the Navy.

Using a tool called an angle cutter, Stephens cuts away the base of a large branch. Later, he’ll peel away the surrounding bark. The idea is to make the branch appear dead, similar to a wild bonsai. The effect is called a “jin.”

Adapting to the tree’s growth and changes in weather make bonsai an intricate and never-ending combination of art and horticulture.

“The only finished bonsai is a dead bonsai,” Conn said. “They’re always growing, they’re always changing. You’re always re-sculpting them, you’re always reworking them.”

Stephens is experiencing just that.

“My problem was I left it covered and it didn’t get much sun so this year it’ll be on a bench where it gets more sunshine,” Stephens said. “So if I cut these back now, with some sunshine it’ll push growth back out in these other places and then I can start cutting branches off where I don’t want them and then the growth elsewhere will start pushing in.”

A Phoenix graft by Merrill Evans of Bremerton. This bonsai is grownaround a piece of driftwood to create a deadwood effect. Photo by Peter O’Cain

Merrill Evans, 73, of Bremerton, has a juniper that hints at what’s capable in bonsai.

Aluminum wire spirals around thin branches, curving them down and then up with patches of green raised toward the sun.

He’s grown his tree around a piece of driftwood, giving it a half-dead appearance. It’s called a Phoenix graft. If done right, it’ll be hard to tell where the living tree begins and the deadwood ends. His tree pulls this off, as one new member was surprised to learn his tree was both living and dead.

Evans has had the wire on his tree for about two years. He has to be watchful of the wiring; if left on too long it can cut into the tree.

“Some trees you put that wire on and it cuts in in six months,” Evans said.

Stephens admires Evans’ tree.

“You can see there’s wire here on this branch but they’ll wire all the way into these fans here and wire the fans of the juniper out here,” Stephens said. “The master’s will tell you, that’s what they want to see.”

Bonsai can be tedious, but Stephens enjoys it.

“This is fun because you get some fine tuning here but a lot of it is when I get home from work during the spring,” Stephens said. “You go out and you water, you know, I’ll go out and I’ll pinch the trees.”

Stephens has 45-50 trees in pots and another 100 in nursery containers which he uses for practice. During the summer he spends about an hour a day watering and pruning.

But again, he only dabbles.

The Evergreen Bonsai Club meets again Feb. 20 at 7:30 p.m. at Crossroads Neighborhood Church 7555 Old Military Road NE in Bremerton where there will be a bonsai garage sale. For more information call 360-626-1264.

John Conn’s tips for beginners

1. Join a bonsai club. Clubs allow beginners to meet veterans who can recommend species of bonsai and answer questions.

2. Basic gardening tools. Bonsai specific tools aren’t necessary to begin, but they are better.

3. Soil mixes depend on climate. In wet areas like Bremerton, it’s important the soil doesn’t retain too much water. A mix of akadama and pumice or red lava rocks are recommended.

4. Be leery of roadside vendors. Some bonsai trees sold from from vans have been purchased at low rates from gardening stores and then sold roadside at a higher price. A good juniper can be bought at a store for $20-$50.

5. Patience. It can take 5-7 years to get a “decent” bonsai when starting from scratch.