The Bonsai News of Houston

Transcription

1 The Bonsai News of Houston A Monthly Newsletter of the Houston Bonsai Society Inc. Volume 49 Number 5 May 2018 IN THIS ISSUE Upcoming Events Deadwood carving with Will Baddeley Showcase of the Month Bonsai & Deadwood May Bonsai Care John Miller President s Letter Photos of LSBF 2018 State Convention In Longview, TX Photos from Spring Show at Japan Fest Hermann Park Deadwood & Will Baddeley Brussel s Rendez-Vous Ancient bristlecone pine with deadwood in The White Mountains, in CA (Photo:Pinterest) The next meeting of the Houston Bonsai Society will be at the Cherie Flores Garden Pavilion in Hermann Park, 1500 Hermann Park Drive, Houston, TX Refreshments at 7 PM, meeting starts at 7:30 PM. May 2 HBS monthly meeting: Deadwood Carving with Will Baddeley, from the United Kingdom. Please bring your bonsai with deadwood and Phoenix grafts for Show & Tell with Ray or for advices from Will. Upcoming Events More details in Calendar of Events and articles May 5 Saturday Study Group at Quality Feed & Garden in the Heights, 9AM- 12 Noon. Free, with refreshments. May 12 Shohin Fukien Tea Workshop at Timeless Trees, Rosenberg, 9 AM - 12 AM, $25 includes a tree, a ceramic pot and wire. May 19, Basic Bonsai #2 Class: Styling and wiring at Timeless Trees, in Rosenberg, 9 AM -12 AM, $60 includes a ficus or boxwood, wire cutters, handout and wire. Everyone goes home with a styled tree. May 25th -27th, Brussel's Rendez-vous, Olive Branch, Mississippi. Brussel s is the largest bonsai nursery in the United States. This 3-day annual rendez-vous is a must for bonsai enthusiasts. 3 days filled with workshops, lectures, demos, classes, shopping and some of the best food. (More details in ad) May 28 Mr Maple Festival Memorial Day from 9-5, at 107 Maplewood Knoll Dr., East Flat Rock, NC Enjoy garden tours, rare trees for sale, and a talk on Japanese maples. Details at or

2 Bonsai with deadwood May Bonsai Care If you did not attend the convention in Longview, you missed what I think was the best one in many years. The chatter sounded upbeat, the workshop teaching I thought was good. For the first time in a long time, the display always had people viewing, discussing and taking pictures - never was the room empty. Don t know how much they sold but the vendors always had people looking at their goods. Probably the lack of any more available space made for a cozier and friendlier atmosphere. In the Dallas area, May is the time you do the leaf pruning job if you have to do it. If you have kept the new growth pinched properly, you have been getting the ramification usually attributed to leaf pruning. The only good reason for leaf pruning is to replace foliage that has been damaged by wind or insects. On some individual plants that have large foliage, the new foliage will usually be smaller. Leaf pruning should be done after the spring foliage has matured and supplied the tree with enough nutrients to produce a good crop of new foliage. It must be done well before the summer heat causes the plant growth to slow or stop. I consider the very latest time (and not at all desirable) to be Memorial Day. Leaf pruning is done by cutting the stems of those leaves that have them (maples) or cutting across the leaf about 1/16 inch from the twig if leaves are attached directly on the twig (elms). The tree should be fertilized 7-10 days before the operation. It will not need as much water until the new foliage has developed. When the nighttime temp stays above 60 degrees, it is time to start repotting the tropicals. Since there are so many different requirements for tropicals I will not try to cover their needs here. But in general, I like to put them in shade and mist them until the new growth starts. Warm humid days are favorable for fungal growth. Watch for mildew, black leaf spot on elms and yaupons, among others. As an organic control, I use hydrogen peroxide in a 1% solution (mix 1 part of the normal 3% commercial product with 2 parts water). Baking soda is also recommended organically. Aphids, spider mites, and scale continue to be the most prevalent insects. The foliar feeding of fish emulsion, liquid kelp, molasses, and apple cider vinegar (1 tablespoon each per gallon of water) is all the control I use for them. Scale is the most difficult because it is covered with a waxy coating (the scale). You may need to use a horticultural oil mixed as directed on the label. Be sure that the direction you read is for summer use as some have two dosages, one for dormancy (usually the first and strongest) and one for summer. Don t use oil on buttonwood or on any other plant not included on the label. If you see damage to the foliage or the plant is not doing well, look for other problems and if you don t recognize the culprit, ask your favorite nurseryman for help.

3 Start checking your pots to see if the sun is heating them up. Our summer sun shining on dark pots can make the soil temperature soar and kill the roots. Try putting your hand on the pot. Roots are living organisms and cannot take high temperatures any more than you can. Heating also dries out the soil making you water more often. Any number of ways of keeping the pots cool will work, the requirement being to prevent the sun from getting to them. I do not care for the aluminum foil methods because I don t want to have the light reflected into my eyes. A simple cloth with a slit to go around the trunk works fine. Remember all the work that you did in the spring? Keep the new growth trimmed so that you haven t wasted your time. While trimming or watering, check the wiring periodically and remove it before it damages the branch. If the branch springs back some, rewire it. If you are not on a regular organic foliar/drench feed schedule, be sure to use fertilizer cakes with supplemental feeding with a good liquid fertilizer, one that includes the minor elements. Most bonsai I see are malnourished. The liquid water soluble fertilizer gets washed out with the next watering and the tree starves until the next infrequent feeding. Time to consider becoming more proficient at your hobby. You can learn all the rules but without practice, you will not be able to perform. You need practice to learn to recognize the line of the raw material you are starting with. You get this practice and experience by taking part in the clubs, various study groups, beginners classes, and workshops. If you are not a beginner, try teaching some beginners since the teacher learns as much as his students by trying to verbalize what he is attempting to teach. Visit conventions especially the local state convention and discuss trees with others to share your ideas on a particular style or species. Happy bonsaiing! John Miller John Miller, who writes a monthly column for the Bonsai Society of Dallas and Fort Worth Bonsai Society, has agreed to share his column with us. We need to make adjustments for our warmer and damper climate, with earlier springs, longer summers, late fall and erratic winters. President s Letter Wow, it s been a busy month of April this year. We had a very successful auction at our monthly meeting and I want to express my thanks to everyone who donated trees and pots as well as those who bought them. A few days later, we were doing our spring show at the Japan Fest. Literally thousands of people walked by our booth and many stopped and talked bonsai with us. We started with 800 brochures and ran out on Sunday afternoon. Scott Barboza did a presentation on bonsai on Saturday and Soon did one on kusamono on Sunday. Both were very well done and well received. Just a few days later we headed to the LSBF convention in Longview where we got to participate in workshops with nationally known artists, catch up with old friends from the other LSBF clubs and share a drink or two with the rest of the pub committee. And, two of our members came home with Excellence in Bonsai awards. Nandita won Best Shohin award for her Ficus Salicaria in a striking yellow pot, and Hurley won Best Tropical bonsai for his Green Island ficus. Hurley s ficus is headed to the 6 th US National show this fall, in Rochester, New York. This month our program will be a deadwood carving demonstration by Will Baddeley. I m particularly looking forward to this program because I ve felt for a long time that some of the European artists were exceptionally talented at creating deadwood effects on bonsai. Will is one of those artists and I hope you ll find time to come see him carve. This month I want to express my gratitude for Ken Cousino. Ken has been our publicity chairperson for several years now. He works tirelessly to get the word out about HBS and to make sure anyone appearing on our behalf is prepared with brochures and other

4 materials. He has also taken on the same role for next year s convention and has already put in a big effort to take Alex Leong s logo drawing and created the convention logo and the advertising materials to go with it. Look for his first ad in the June issue of the ABS Journal. ready by the time convention comes around. I had planned on bringing an azalea, but it was finished flowering well before. TTSBE was planning on a Bougie but the multiple cold fronts here (Austin) kept the flowers away. This has been an odd year with my trees. The tropicals have been slow to recover from winter, presumably due to the severe cold snap that we had. The deciduous trees, on the other hand, have gone crazy and are demanding attention a good month before they normally have their spring work done. So, I am off to the bonsai bench to try and catch up to the deciduous trees. See you at the meeting. Pete Parker 2018 LONE STAR BONSAI FEDERATION ANNUAL CONVENTION Blooming Bonsai Joey McCoy of Austin club and TTSBE is the bearded young man, on the left. He is the talented photographer who has shared with HBS exhibit and convention photos for many years. This year, Houston area had pretty much the same rough weather, unless we keep our Bougies and tropical flowering bonsai in heated greenhouses. Most of our azaleas, forsythia, quinces, Japanese Magnolias, Carolina Jessamine and even Wisterias bloomed out in the last two months. Since I was not present to witness all the beautiful works of art and to participate in fun activities, I will do my very best to guess what Joey s photos recorded. Here are just a few to start. And Group plantings hosted by the Longview Bonsai Society April 20-22, 2018 at Hilton Garden Inn, Longview, Texas Here are some of the photos of the event shared by Joey McCoy of Austin club. It really was a terrific weekend. Wish you could have been there!, he wrote when he sent the photos to me. Flowering and fruiting bonsai are my all-time favorite but my work required me to spend the week up North. It's funny, many remarked that there weren't many flowering or forests too, but you just never know what will be HBS Alex Leong working on the finishing touches in the Texas Talent contest, while Sharon Barker and Ann Harris watched. Clyde Holt is still in the first solo phase at the other end of the stage. After each team member has a turn to prune and style the tree in silence, the three of

5 them can work together in the last phase. No talking means everyone has to learn sign language fast. Alex, Sharon and Ann won Texas Talent second place from Joshua/Ruyu tools, of $100 each. Here are a few photos from the bonsai exhibit. Each row had only one flowering bonsai. One of the few group plantings, graced by Mark Bynum.

6 Hoe s azalea trained for the last 19 years from nursery stock The headliners Bonsai Boon, Rodney Clemens and Mike Lane enjoying a drink with Mark Bynum before their demo.

7 Boon, one of the premier bonsai masters who specialize in junipers and other conifers, started with a bushy and dense Procumbens juniper. He pruned away many of the major branches to simplify the silhouette and movement to create a very gracious cascade bonsai. He also took the time to save a few of the stumps for jin and shari. Mike Lane, who came from Florida, knows his tropicals rather intimately. He started with an urban yamadori bougainvillea with a very wide base, a lot of deadwood and large leaves too. Bougies at this time usually just finished their first bloom phase. Most of them in the South will soon put out another show for the summer, often lasting till late fall. What to do with this? Rodney contemplated when surprised by such a gigantic demo material. Rodney Clemens started with an unusually enormous Yaupon holly. Most of the time, yaupons are grown as low bushes. Those trained as bonsai are rather compact, never this tall. He decided to slightly reduce its height in a windswept style. A lot less foliage, thinner ramification but the completed bonsai is still massive! Notice how the branches were pruned like arches, similar to those found on old deciduous trees that shed their dead wood annually. Since bougies are prolific growers, Mike discarded a lot of the really deadwood and reduced the branches just a few. Unlike Juniper deadwood that remains strong, especially if treated with Lime Sulphur, bougies deadwood rots easily with water retention and turns to sawdust over time. Now on to the awards for the exhibited trees. This year, Houston is proud to claim two awards. Nandita D Souza, who displayed 3 Shohin together with 3 of Ray Gonzalez Shohin, won Best Shohin award for her remarkable but tiny Ficus Nerofilia (or Salicaria). It was recently defoliated to show off the nice trunk taper and the spreading nebari. The sunny yellow pot is unusual but very charming for this little guy.

8 Hurley Johnson received the Best Tropical award for a very imposing Green Island Ficus on a rock. It has been accepted for the 6 th US National exhibit in Rochester, New York this fall. Mark Copeland won Best Broadleaf Evergreen award for an outstanding Japanese Satsuki Azalea. These early blooms are a rare treat since Satsuki means bloom in the 6 th month in Japan. And now, a big Tako drum roll for Dawn Keating! Sylvia Smith of Dallas club won Best Deciduous award with a stunning Japanese Maple. Together with her husband Howard Smith, she received an Honorable Mention award for a landscape created at last year s LSBF by headliner Bjorn Bjorholm. She brought home 3 awards for one truly awesome forest: Best Texas Native award, Best Group Planting award and Best of Show award. That s all for now, folks. More photos coming from Joey next month! Thanks Joey for being my eyes when I can t be there and more thanks for sharing your photographic talent from all of us at HBS. Shawn Nguyen

9 HBS 2018 Spring Show at The 25 th Japan Fest Anthony discussing his uniquely gorgeous ochre yellow bougainvillea to mesmerized soon to be bonsai lovers. After the cold and stormy morning, a huge crowd stopped by to visit our Spring Show. (Photo: Shawn Nguyen) We had a great show at the Japanese Garden during the Japan Fest. The 800 brochures we brought were all gone! Conservatively, there must be over 1,000 visitors who came to see our displays. A great advertising and educational event! 16 volunteers helped out at the show. Thank you very much! Other than the drizzling, windy and cold Saturday morning, we had great weather the rest of the day and Sunday. We are very pleased with the storage facility the Park Conservancy provided. Our trees were securely stored in a locked shed. The President of the Japan-American Society, Bill Weiland, and the Japan Fest coordinator, Barbara Metysko, came to thank and congratulate us for the fine show we put out. We want to thank the Japan-America Society and the Park Conservancy for working closely with us to make this a successful event. Thank you Shawn for buying and bringing sandwiches and snacks on Saturday for the volunteers. That saved us from having to line-up at the food stalls. Shawn, Ray, Hoe, Soon and Elaine snuggling under the tent, waiting for the sun to come out. We have kusamono and trees at different stage of development, from young to mature specimens. We want to be inclusive and encourage everyone to participate and feel proud to show their trees. Big thanks to those who brought their trees. Like last year, the mysterious Japanese musician stopped and played a beautiful but sad melody for us. Two years in a row he appeared at our show, yet we never saw his face.

10 Special thanks go to Scott for the wonderful bonsai presentation you ve done on Saturday and to Soon as well, for your demonstration on kusamono and companion plants on Sunday. Ryan Vollert Scott Barboza Shawn Nguyen Soon Cheah Hoe Chuah Calendar of Events 2018 Soon s weed habit fascinated many viewers, especially teenagers and young children. (Photo: Shawn Nguyen) Scott Barboza presenting Bonsai, Zero Calorie to a very mesmerized crowd. (Photo: Shawn Nguyen) Here is the list of volunteers: Al Smith Anthony Cutola Blain Davis Chris Lannen Cozzy Knitowski Dean Laumen Elaine Cogswell Hoe Chuah Kim Unerfussen Leslie Nguyen Pete Parker Ray Gonzalez MAY 2 HBS meeting: Deadwood Carving Techniques with Will Baddeley from the UK. MAY 5 Saturday Study Group at Quality Feed & Garden in the Heights, 9AM-1PM. Free with refreshments. MAY 12 Shohin Fukien Tea Workshop at Timeless Trees, Rosenberg, 9AM -12 Noon. $25 includes a tree, a ceramic pot and wire. MAY 19, Basic Bonsai #2 Class: Styling and wiring at Timeless Trees, Rosenberg, 9AM-12 Noon. $60 includes a ficus or boxwood, wire cutters, hand-out and wire. MAY 25-27, Brussel's Rendez-vous, Olive Branch, MS, near Memphis, TN. Brussel s is the largest bonsai nursery in the United States. This 3-day annual rendez-vous is a must for bonsai enthusiasts. MAY 28 Mr Maple Festival Memorial Day at 107 Maplewood Knoll Dr., East Flat Rock, NC Enjoy garden tours, rare trees for sale, and a talk on maples. Details at or JUN 6 HBS meeting Japanese Black Pine Seedling Cutting Technique with Brian Gurrola JUN 9 Saturday Study Group at Maas Nursery, 5511 Todville Road, Seabrook, Texas Free, refreshments JUN 16 Shohin club - Mexican Heather as Shohin material with May Lau, at Persimmon Hill Bonsai, Red Hawk Cove, Austin, TX. Contact Steven Hendricks at stevenhendricks@sbcglobal.net or JUN Years of Bonsai in Poland & Black Scissors International Bonsai Festival at Arboretum Wojslawice, Niemcza, Poland. Featuring Kevin Wilson (UK), Robert Steven (Indonesia), Zhang Xuming & Chen Yougui (China), Vaclav Novak (Czech Republic), Kestutis Ptakauskas (Lithuania), and Grzegorz Sowiński (Poland). For details contact Wlodlzimierz Pietrazko at pietraszko@bonsai.pl or

11 Deadwood and Will Baddeley Bonsai lovers often choose the most attractive shapes for their bonsai from observing nature. The Next Gen s bonsai masters of today venture out into the wild country and remote mountain tops to study trees split in half by lighting, clinging for dear life to mountain cliffs, uprooted by animals, bare rooted by land corrosion, as well as those stunted, contorted, broken off, by wind, flood, snow, or even drought. They found beauty in the wabi-sabi character of ancient trees, like the ancient bristlecone pine with deadwood in The White Mountains of California. Austere and lonely on very harsh living conditions, these bristle cone pines are believed to be the oldest living trees in North America today, dating back to thousands of years. Here is a Juniper masterpiece by master Cheng Kung 1. Before 2. After with a lot of flowing deadwood (Photo: Pinterest) From what they observed, the bonsai artists tried to recreate this effect, called Driftwood style. Dead wood, trunk, branches, roots are becoming more and more popular on trees displayed in the best bonsai exhibits, such as the oldest Kokufuten in Japan and now around the world. To curb the yamadori (collected trees) appetite of the millions of bonsai lovers, many countries have started an ancient tree collection prohibition. A very dramatic bonsai with humble beginnings by Harry Harrington (Photo: Bonsai Bark) Why does the art of bonsai depart from the perfectly shaped miniatures to favor rugged beauty of weathered deadwood of ancient trees? Let s first revisit what or who started the bonsai art and what influenced it the most over the years. Some believe mankind has learned to cultivate plants in pots as far as 5,000 years ago. Potted trees however only began to take on shapes resembling what we call bonsai today, just a couple thousand years ago. Zen Buddhism which originated in China as Chan Buddhism, borrowed heavily from Taoist philosophy, that transformed from a religion with many doctrines and rituals, into a simple way of life. In the 15 th, Chan traveling monks brought to Japan what is now known as Zen Buddhism. It flourished in Japan and has profoundly impregnated everything Japanese, from calligraphy to literature, poetry, painting, tea ceremony and given birth to garden design, flower arrangement - Ikebana and the Art of Bonsai. Zen aesthetics require the mastery of artistic skills to combine intuition and sensitivity, but

12 emphasizes subtlety and tranquility, simplicity and austerity, known as wabi-sabi, shibui and yugen. It includes Taoism that emphasizes man s harmony with nature, symbolized by the 3-point triangle that represents heaven, man and earth. So what does Zen Art aim to evoke? Mostly an emotional response in the mind of the observer. How? Japanese aesthetics often combine wabi, sabi, shibui and yugen. They are in a way suggestions, guidelines and sometimes subtle restrictions. Wabi is associated with melancholy, loneliness, austerity, nostalgia, feelings one might have when longing for a faraway homeland or a childhood home lost in distant mountains. Sabi is associated with feelings of timelessness, ruggedness, survival, resilience and humility, like memory of an old tree ravaged by storms and fires, whose history was etched into its lacerated bark. Will Haddeley s Yew with intricate carving Shibui is the impression one gets from following the dynamic movement of a bonsai trunk. It may be either elegant or majestic, sturdy and masculine, or dainty and feminine. Yugen is the feeling that arises when one contemplates a bonsai. Most viewers find bonsai enchanting, mystical or peaceful, yet trees with hollow trunks appear enigmatic or with grotto like cavities hidden by gnarly roots may bring on horror. A split trunk speaks of a dramatic past when struck by lightning. A banyan tree aerial roots draping over a boulder depicts a haunting and eerie feeling. Dan Robinson s carved Bougie (Photo: adamaskwhy) Since 1980s, driftwood or deadwood style bonsai have captured the imagination of many bonsai artists. Since we see more and more trees with deadwood, real or attached to younger trees, in exhibits all over the world. The first trees were mostly hard wood conifers like junipers, cedar, spruce and yew, with carved wood preserved with a lime-sulfur solution. Later on, brave artists experimented with broadleaved deciduous deadwood which often rots quickly. Not long ago, shari (debarked areas) and jin (exposed dead branches) were not recommended but when LSBF invited Dan Robinson to LSBF convention in New Braunfels, he carved every tree in sight, even bougainvillea. His secret weapon is Cure Rot, a type of epoxy filler that can protect the tenderest woods. In the past decade, many bonsai masters focus mainly on collected material from the mountains or harsh conditions with extensive deadwood. At times, they may add some more driftwood or deadwood to these yamadori (collected trees) for more drama. Those who don t have the expertise or the chance to collect trees, can start with the end in mind. That means adding young trees to a piece of really dead deadwood or driftwood. In Japan, those are called Tanuki (treachery) but in the US, we call them by a more mystical name, Phoenix grafts.

13 information like a sponge. My main influences have come from the likes of Colin Lewis and his passion for natives and in particular Ulmus minor. Also Kevin Willson and his work with wild material and deadwood work with power tools. More deadwood than live plant (Photo: Pinterest) In this coming month of May, HBS will have the privilege to welcome Will Baddeley for a deadwood carving demo. Well known in the United Kingdom, and in many European countries for his carving talents, Will has been teaching novices and advanced students for over a decade. Following is an excerpt from his blog which can be read in its entirety at: As long as I remember, I have always had a huge appreciation of nature. My love affair with trees was there long before I came across Bonsai. My first tree came from a Petrol station back in It didn't last long. But in the mean time I bought a book by Colin Lewis and was hooked by the idea of using native trees to make Bonsai. I then went about collecting as many different species of tree as possible, bought as many books as I could afford and joined a local club. In 2001 my club entered me in the New Talent Competition. I won the UK heats and represented my Country in Trevarez, France in 2002 and came third. I am self-taught if there is such a thing. Observant and committed would be another way of putting it as I soak up The carving was refined and the tree was restyled. Although the deadwood is now the focus of this tree, I do not usually advocate this in deciduous trees as the deadwood is transient and will not last like junipers or Pines with a

14 high resin content. This tree does however have excellent movement and the hollow will make an excellent feature also. Bonsai Phil Check out one of his masterpiece from beginning to the finished product. Now it appears to pop out of some horror movies, inhabited by some wicked deities. You can see a lot of Will Baddeley s work on the Internet Bonsai Club, where he discusses trees. If you have deadwood projects you are unsure on how to get started or if you would like a second opinion, please bring them to the next meeting. Will is well known to give out advices freely. Shawn Nguyen Brussel s Rendez-Vous MAY 25th -27th This 3-day annual Rendez-vous at Brussel s, the largest bonsai nursery in the US, in Olive Branch, Mississippi, a must for bonsai enthusiasts, will be filled with workshops, lectures, demos, classes, shopping and some of the best food. Make plans early with the two dozen of HBS members who make this trip every year. This month, we welcome back an old friend and vendor: Phillip Drilling of Cabrera Farm Nursery, also known as Bonsai Phil. He has been a member of HBS for the past 18 years as well as a vendor who provides bonsai and some bonsai supplies to bonsai afficianadoes in the Houston and Sugar Land area. Stop by and enjoy Phil sweekly bonsai show, bonsai sale, and a study group to learn about the art of bonsai, every Saturday morning from 8AM-12 Noon, at the Urban Harvest Eastside Farmers Market at 3000 Richmond. While you are there, don t forget to pick up some fresh cut flowers too. Phil also has a lot of pre-bonsai and large bonsai material that he cannot bring to market. If you would like to check them out at Cabrera Farm Nursery during the week, please call for an appointment and directions. The 6 headliners are world renowned artists: Marc Noelanders from Belgium, Kathy Shaner from California, Rodney Clemons from Georgia, Todd Schaffer from Colorado, Juan Andrade from Costa Rica/ Florida, John Powell from Wichita Falls, and Byron Myrick from Mississippi.

15 Make sure you go to Timeless Trees website and subscribe to weekly Current Events to stay in the know. You can find the best gifts: trees, pots, all sorts of bonsai supplies, soils of all kinds, tools and books for your bonsai lovers and yourself. Classes are offered every weekend. Spring is here and thousands of flowering azaleas, camellias and quinces are blooming at JRN II. They do well as indoor bonsai. Arrangements of citrus trees, orchids and flowers can be ordered for the New Year and all other occasions. Quality Feed & Garden and Ken stand ready to help you with bonsai trees, basic tools, pots and soils like Akadama, Lava, Pumice, Kanuma, and Ken s Bonsai Soil in 10 lb. & 50 lb. bags. Free Study classes for HBS every 3-months Ask for 10% HBS discount. Visit artist Andrew Sankowski at the Mossrock Studio & Fine Art Gallery for the finest gifts and most uniquely beautiful bonsai pots in every shape, form and color. Personalized pots or gifts can be commissioned year round. Weekly pottery classes are also available. Andrew Sankowski Oak Ridge Drive Direct (281) The Woodlands, TX Fax (281) andy@mossrockstudio.com Come stock up on bonsai soils, pesticides, fungicides, fertilizers and other supplies. The plant doctor is always on duty, so bring your unhappy or unhealthy bonsai for a free check-up. Don t forget to ask for a 10% HBS discount. For high quality daizas for viewing stones, Suiseki, bonsai stands and Shoji screens in any shape, form, style, wood, dimensions and colors, please visit artist Jerry Braswell. Send him your designs and specifications for custom wood work. For more info:

16 Houston Bonsai Society, Inc. P. O. Box , Houston, Texas HBS Board Members President Pete Parker 1 st Vice President Scott Barboza in charge of Education 2 nd Vice President Hoe Chuah hoe.chuah@gmaill.com Secretary Maria Grissom maria.l.grissom@uth.tmc.edu Publicity Ken Cousino krcousino@yahoo.com Treasurer Eldon Branham elmo4635@aol.com in charge of Membership Webmaster Anthony Cutola acutola@gmail.com Member at Large - O Gale Childers f5gale@macconnect.com Member at Large - O James Kelly kurstyn.castillo@gmail.com Member at Large - O Ryan Vollert rmvnucks@gmail.com Member at Large E Sharon Barker barkersharonr48@gmail.com Member at Large - E Ray González raygonzalez47@yahoo.com Member at Large E Brian Gurrola bgurrola@gurrolareprographics.com Delegates Past President Hurley Johnson hurley@all-tex.net LSBF Delegate Terry Dubois tdubois1@comcast.net LSBF Alternate Pete Parker peteparkerbonsai@yahoo.com BCI Ambassador TTSBE Representative Alan Raymond amraymond@suddenlink.net Refreshments Website/ Gary Teeter houstonbonsai@gmail.com Newsletter editor Shawn Nguyen hbs.news@yahoo.com The Bonsai News of Houston is a monthly publication of the Houston Bonsai Society, Inc. Copyright The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the consent of the editor or a member of the Board of Directors. Exceptions exist, however, for certain not-for-profit and non-profit bonsai organizations or associated bonsai and bonsai nursery newsletters, including without limitation the American Bonsai Society. HBS participates fully with reciprocation of contents and material between other LSBF member organizations and others. Authors who submit articles for this newsletter thereby give permission to such organizations to reprint, unless they expressly state otherwise. Space for advertising in The Bonsai News of Houston can be requested by contacting the newsletter editor or a member of the HBS Board. The rates for a business-card-size ad (approximately 3 1/2" x 2") are $10 per month, and $75 per year (12 issues). A full-page ad is $50 per month. Rates are subject to change without notice. 3½" x 2" classified ads are run free of charge for one month once per 12-month period for non-commercial members. For special requests or questions related to The Bonsai News of Houston, contact the newsletter editor or a member of the HBS Board.