Recent content by BillsBayou

Let me know how that comes out. It's not a bald cypress, but I'd still like to know.

The charcoal raises the pH, not that much, but the rest is fairly neutral. Kanuma is acidic. Kind of a balance. However, I'm not actually checking the pH. The ficus is going to be happy anyway.

Repotted last night. Many roots on the right side of the base were hanging out of a the previous pot. Finally got around to wrangling them. Goal is to keep this healthy and bring it to Corpus Christi, Texas to a BYOT workshop with Mike Lane in September. I have another couple of green islands...

Me too. I look at what people are posting in the serious threads and come here and say what I really wanted to say. Or maybe I go poking around on the web to see what's for sale. Inspiration is everywhere . By the way. The original price was $435. I realized that price was for much smaller...

I went around the base of the tree, just above the concrete, and nicked the trunk in several places. The nicks were dusted with rooting hormone. The nursery tub is too short to cover the concrete with soil. To fix this, I used the side walls of a smaller nursery pot to make a wall around the...

Randy Bennett was one of the first people I met in bonsai. His advice is gold. He has been doing a great deal of travelling lately. If you get a chance to see him, please do! The drawing is by Vaughn Banting (his initials bottom left of trunk). I once had the chance to be sitting with him in...

Brilliant! A word of caution, I once (ONCE!) styled a tree after a crawfish boil. I drank too much Abita Amber and grabbed my concave cutters. The next day I looked at the tree and screamed "WHERE DID MY BRANCH GO?!?" Sober Bill HATES Drunk Bill. I don't have a drinking problem, I have a...

Absolutely going to do this. Thanks.

Is that the stretch of median that's always flooded? Tempting. 2017, a car crosses the I-10 median and crashes head-on, around mile marker 5. We were stopped near Kiln for 3 hours. We left after midnight. Enormous tragedy, sure, but it gets me thinking. If I had a shovel, I could have been...

This is part of the median at a nearby intersection. I'm waiting for the light to change and suddenly yell "Crepe Myrtles!" At some point during recent roadwork a crepe myrtle was crushed or removed. Beneath these weeds there just might be something worth collecting. The police department of...

My local Walmart has salsa bowls on clearance for 10-cents each. Inside measurements are 4"x2". Add another half inch for the outside measurements. The feet on these bowls elevate the bowls enfor good drainage. I'll be putting portulacara afras I these. My recommendation is to NEVER use...

The truth we never tell when someone shows us their mallsai.

That's a graft. The root stock is likely a standard bald cypress. The shoots coming out of the base will not be peve minaret. I recommend removing them. The root stock of many trees are often much stronger than the grafts. Bonsai with grafted bases rarely make good bonsai. These trees suffer...