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1. Plant the young trident maple in the ground over a cement slab that is buried less than 6 inches below the surface of the soil. This first stage helps the tree to develop a thick trunk while forcing its roots to spread out and remain shallow. An alternative to planting over a slab is to use a large, but shallow, training pot. This stage can take up to five years, depending on the trunk thickness you desire. Plant in full sun if you can water the tree every day. Otherwise, plant in partial shade. 2. Repot the tree in a bonsai pot using freely draining bonsai soil when the trunk has grown to the desired thickness. Tease out the roots so that they are spread evenly around the tree and near the surface. Cut the tree down to the desired height at the same time. This should be done early in the late winter before spring arrives and leaf buds have begun to swell. 3. Wire a branch near the top of the newly cut tree into a new leader position, but allow others to grow freely. The tree eventually reshapes itself so that the new leader becomes part of the trunk. 4. Cut the new leader back to less than 4 inches long at the end of the growing season. Repeat this process each year, cutting the new growth of the leader back to less than 4 inches. This gives a tapered appearance to the trunk so that it better mimics a full-grown tree in miniature. This process of reshaping can take several years. 5. Prune away all branches that are not in the correct position for bonsai shaping in the fall or late winter. Cut back the desired branches to five nodes near the bottom of the tree and two nodes near the top. Nodes are the areas on the branch where leaves grow. 6. Remove all but two pairs of leaves on each branch during the growing season. Defolating a trident maple encourages more leaves to grow than were removed, which reduces leaf size and improves the minuature look of the bonsai tree. The tree can only support a given total leaf area for its size, so when leaf number increases, leaf size decreases.