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Today I found two natural bonsai of olive europaea. I think that it is the sylvestris variety based on the fact that the distance between the leaves is very small. Also, the way the leaves are arranged is more similar to the sylvestris variety than to the normal one that it's cultivated where I live.

Even if I'm not an expert in bonsai, I think that this is a real one and not a young tree because it's strongly branched, like an old tree. It seems just a smaller version of a bigger wild one. I found it on an old macera (a type of stone wall), so without much soil.

How could I know how old is it? If I put some photos here are you able to tell it (I didn't have a phone, so I didn't take any picture of it)?

gvgramazio
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Tricky because age is a part of the illusion of the bonsai. In general, you can't tell. You can look at the bark and make an estimate based on that but even then there are tricks a bonsai grower can take to make the tree look older in terms of the bark. In theory, you could take a core sample and count the rings; however, you risk damaging the tree that way. I don't believe you are going to be able to tell how old it is just by looking at it.

Rob
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  • I'm talking about a wild bonsai. This means that a bonsai grower (or any other man) has never touched it. I don't know if this can change anything. Also, I'm not interested in a precise estimation, just a rough one. Just to know if I'm wrong and it's only one year old tree or it's more than ten years old bonsai. – gvgramazio Aug 16 '18 at 17:02
  • @gvgramazio Post a picture of the tree please. – Rob Aug 16 '18 at 17:09
  • Now it's dark here. Tomorrow I will go again there, take some pictures of it and update my post. – gvgramazio Aug 16 '18 at 17:57