Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: To baby trees.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: The Black Pondo podcast.
[00:00:18] Speaker C: The Black Pondo podcast.
We can. Well, we can walk around.
[00:00:24] Speaker B: Why don't we walk around?
[00:00:25] Speaker C: Yeah, let's do it.
So I'm recording already, but I can edit anything out.
[00:00:30] Speaker D: Got it.
[00:00:31] Speaker C: And so, yeah, we're good.
[00:00:33] Speaker D: This is cool.
[00:00:34] Speaker C: Yeah. I should be able to clip it on.
[00:00:36] Speaker D: Are they magnetic?
[00:00:37] Speaker C: They are, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
[00:00:38] Speaker E: That's the truth.
[00:00:39] Speaker C: Magnetic, Easy, portable and everything. Yeah, yeah. How you been, man? What you been up to? Working a lot.
[00:00:47] Speaker D: Busy, Crazy working. Trying to build a garden and get benches made and get material, you know.
[00:00:55] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:00:56] Speaker D: The bonsai. The bonsai game.
[00:00:58] Speaker C: Hell, yeah.
[00:00:59] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:00:59] Speaker C: You adapted back to the United States now. It's been a while.
[00:01:03] Speaker D: I'm here. I'm good. I'm American again.
[00:01:06] Speaker C: Heck, yeah.
So what are your thoughts on the show?
[00:01:10] Speaker D: I mean, it's. It's fantastic. I think what, you know, Jonas and Eric and Andrew have done to really bring the community together is fantastic. It's not just, you know, it's not just about bringing great trees and inspiring people, but it's bringing all the vendors together and people and supporting the vendors and, you know, making people want to do better and strive for better. And so that in itself is huge.
[00:01:39] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:01:40] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:01:41] Speaker C: I completely agree with you. And I feel like they don't even get enough credit almost. It's like everyone should go up to them and say thank you.
[00:01:50] Speaker D: Yeah, exactly.
[00:01:50] Speaker C: For everything that you've done. Yeah. Because this is so important. And they were. They stepped up as leaders and basically, like, definitely took it on.
[00:01:59] Speaker D: Definitely.
[00:01:59] Speaker C: Which is incredible. And what we need sometimes.
[00:02:02] Speaker D: And, you know, I'd like. What I'd really like to see is more people involved in the little things and letting them kind of work on the bigger things and getting, you know, younger people to continue this.
[00:02:17] Speaker C: For sure.
[00:02:18] Speaker D: Because who's going to do it when Jonas doesn't want to do it anymore? Eric doesn't want to do it anymore. Right. So we need people to kind of learn how this all happens and gets put together and.
[00:02:28] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[00:02:29] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:02:29] Speaker C: Yeah. Well, it's. It's good that they got Andrew involved this year. Yeah. And I. I agree with you. I hope that they get some people working under them. Yeah. Who could maybe potentially take it on.
[00:02:40] Speaker D: I mean, I'm sure there's probably countless people who helped in many different ways. Right. But to be leaders in that sense is fantastic.
[00:02:51] Speaker C: Yeah. For sure. So how many trees do you work on in this show?
[00:02:56] Speaker D: Oh, let's see. One, two, three, four, five, maybe six.
[00:03:07] Speaker C: Six.
[00:03:08] Speaker D: Six.
[00:03:08] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah, man. I'm very impressed with how clean your work looks. Thank you. I especially like this California juniper that you worked on.
[00:03:17] Speaker D: Thank you. Yes. No, little. Very little credit to me.
[00:03:21] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:03:21] Speaker D: It's not my trade, you know, I just cleaned it up. But thank you. I appreciate it.
[00:03:26] Speaker C: Yeah.
Who's the owner on this tree?
[00:03:29] Speaker D: This is Janet Nelson.
[00:03:30] Speaker C: Oh, okay.
[00:03:31] Speaker D: Yeah, they have a lot of really great trees in their yard, but this one is really show ready and just kind of cleaned up and. Yeah. But thank you.
[00:03:42] Speaker C: Yeah. Fantastic, man.
[00:03:44] Speaker D: Yeah. Thank you.
[00:03:45] Speaker C: It's gorgeous.
[00:03:45] Speaker D: I really like the separation and the pads like the depth. You can really see the depth on this tree. I really like that. So really cool tree.
[00:03:53] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:03:53] Speaker D: Really interesting.
[00:03:54] Speaker C: Very clean.
[00:03:55] Speaker D: Yeah. Thank you.
[00:03:56] Speaker C: Awesome. Cool, man.
[00:04:00] Speaker D: What about you?
What trees do you have here?
[00:04:03] Speaker C: Just one.
[00:04:04] Speaker D: Just one huge redwood.
[00:04:06] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:04:07] Speaker D: Nice.
[00:04:07] Speaker C: Yes. Yes. Yeah. I'm happy with the way it came out.
All thanks to Peter T. He's helped me out, of course, tremendously.
[00:04:16] Speaker D: But the stand is amazing. I love that stand.
[00:04:20] Speaker C: Thank you so much.
[00:04:20] Speaker D: Yeah, it goes. It just goes. It pairs so well with the whole tree. Ah, it's really nice.
[00:04:25] Speaker C: I was hoping so. I know the. The hole in it is a bit dramatic, but it's. I was hoping that it would match because the trunk is.
[00:04:34] Speaker D: Yeah, it's a similar approach, but. But it matches. And it feels like it's supposed to be there. You know, a lot of redwood has those holes and kind of undulating dead features, and so it's really cool and interesting.
[00:04:49] Speaker C: Morning. How are you doing, man? Thank you so much, man. Appreciate it.
Yeah. So what. What clubs are you working with these days?
[00:04:59] Speaker D: And a lot of the clubs in the Bay Area.
[00:05:02] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:05:02] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:02] Speaker C: Sweet. Are you involved with the Redwood Empire?
[00:05:06] Speaker D: Yep.
[00:05:07] Speaker C: Sweet.
[00:05:07] Speaker D: We do some workshops and.
Yeah, I kind of have a lot of workshop groups around the area.
[00:05:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:05:17] Speaker D: Kind of do some in SoCal and then back and forth.
[00:05:21] Speaker C: That's fantastic.
[00:05:22] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:05:22] Speaker C: And are you open to work?
[00:05:24] Speaker D: Of course.
[00:05:25] Speaker F: Yeah.
[00:05:26] Speaker D: That's the name of the game.
[00:05:27] Speaker C: Awesome.
[00:05:28] Speaker D: I travel, I go, you know, private days, workshop days, club days.
[00:05:33] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:05:34] Speaker D: Okay.
[00:05:35] Speaker C: And what city are you based out of again?
[00:05:37] Speaker B: I'm.
[00:05:38] Speaker F: We're.
[00:05:38] Speaker D: I'm in the Bay Area. Hayward.
[00:05:39] Speaker C: Hayward.
[00:05:39] Speaker D: Okay.
[00:05:40] Speaker C: Sweet. Very nice.
[00:05:41] Speaker D: Will travel for work.
[00:05:44] Speaker C: Nice. Nice.
Yeah, I watched a demo. It's been a while now, but I think CBS or One of the SoCal clubs had you down. You did a thing on air layering.
[00:05:55] Speaker D: Oh, okay.
[00:05:56] Speaker C: You showed using that was, like, right.
[00:05:57] Speaker D: When I got back.
[00:05:58] Speaker C: It's been a while.
[00:05:59] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:06:00] Speaker C: That was rad, though.
[00:06:01] Speaker D: My Philosophy has changed as time goes on.
[00:06:06] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:06:09] Speaker D: But really what I'm trying to push now or further, further along, like, like the agenda I'm pushing now is showing. Yeah, I really want to see better small trees.
[00:06:25] Speaker F: Absolutely.
[00:06:26] Speaker D: And so I have been working with a lot of people and trying to, you know, put out a lot of information to help people grow and make better small trees.
[00:06:40] Speaker C: For sure. Very cool. Awesome.
Any. Any general tips regarding shohin? I feel like we don't yet see a lot of good American sho.
[00:06:52] Speaker D: Yeah, right. So the only thing I would really say is we need people, we need hobbyists, we need enthusiasts to just start growing for fun. Like we don't need huge operations, Huge, huge grow operations. But start, you know, 5, 10 of one thing and just kind of let them grow. We're never going to get good material, shohin material unless we're not going to have that material in the future. Unless we have hobbyists, enthusiasts to really take on the initiative to start growing and making small trees. Yeah, really with small shohin and mame, they have to be started from scratch, you know, good ones.
[00:07:42] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:07:43] Speaker D: And so we got to start somewhere.
Now is the time.
[00:07:47] Speaker C: Most definitely.
[00:07:47] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:07:48] Speaker C: Just curious. I know that you studied in Japan and you focused on traditional Asian and Japanese species. Are there any American or native trees that you like for shohin particularly?
[00:08:01] Speaker D: Oh, yeah. Interesting.
Redwoods are fantastic. I mean, just a fantastic American species for showing.
[00:08:13] Speaker C: Yeah. Sweet.
[00:08:14] Speaker D: You know, redwoods can be any kind of style and they'll fit shore junipers.
There's a really cool here at the Expo Shing display with like ficuses and dogwood and, you know, species from Florida that are really cool.
[00:08:37] Speaker C: Are you into oaks at all?
[00:08:39] Speaker D: I mean, how could I forget? How could I forget about oaks? Oaks are just like re. Backbud really well. I mean, cork oaks back bud from corked bark. So they're just like such a perfect species for growing for shohin. Yeah.
[00:08:57] Speaker C: Awesome, man. Awesome.
[00:08:59] Speaker D: So don't be afraid. Try it. Even if the leaves are a little big, it's okay. Right? We just want interesting style trees and we'll find a way to use them.
[00:09:10] Speaker C: Yeah, for sure. Awesome, man. Well, hey, I have really enjoyed following everything that you're doing.
[00:09:16] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:09:17] Speaker C: Where can people find you your Instagram or like Facebook or how do they contact you?
[00:09:21] Speaker D: Yeah. So you can email me at adam.jp.bo n gmail.com or message me on Instagram. Check out my Instagram adam.jp.bo n and that's kind of where I'm Most active and easy. Easily to reach.
[00:09:43] Speaker C: Yeah. Awesome, man. Hey, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it, dude. And I'll see you soon.
[00:09:49] Speaker D: Yeah. Thank you so much. I think, you know, American bonsai is really coming along together and it's exciting to see every, you know, every two years, how great it's really getting.
[00:10:00] Speaker C: Hell, yeah.
[00:10:01] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:10:02] Speaker C: Thanks. Awesome, man.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:10:09] Speaker C: Yeah, so I am recording right now, but I can edit anything out and if you. If we say anything that you. You're not happy with, we could totally edit it out.
[00:10:18] Speaker B: Sweet. So you need it out the bed, but make it sound. Make it sound good.
[00:10:21] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:10:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that sounds cool, man. Awesome. Yeah, yeah.
[00:10:25] Speaker C: Would you give a brief introduction on yourself? Tell me who you. Who you are.
[00:10:30] Speaker B: So I'm Richard Cooney from New Zealand, and basically I've been doing bonsai for a long, long time and for about the last five, six years. Started making my own pots. And I have a bit of a unique process on how I make them. Yeah.
[00:10:50] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah, yeah. No, I absolutely love your pots. They are very, very beautiful. And I'm excited that I got this opportunity to chat with you. You came from a long ways away.
[00:11:03] Speaker B: Yeah. All the way from New Zealand. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not too far. Yeah, Yeah.
[00:11:07] Speaker C: I guess. First off, before we jump into your pots, which I would love to, what's your. What's your thoughts on the expo and how's it been for you so far?
[00:11:16] Speaker B: Expo is super good. Like, the expo is amazing. The level of trees here is just crazy. Like, this is the sort of thing that anyone from New Zealand dreams of being able to come and see. Like, we don't have the level of trees in New Zealand that you have here. So just to see them, you know, in person, up close is. It's just amazing. Yeah, yeah.
[00:11:38] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah, awesome. Yeah. So would you tell me about it? Looks to me from your Instagram and actually if you wouldn't mind telling us what your Instagram is. But it looks like you have a unique process and I would love to dive into that, but I also don't want you to give me any of your ultra fine secrets that you don't want to share. So please.
[00:12:00] Speaker B: I share everything. I share my whole process. So basically, I share my whole process pretty much apart from my glaze recipes. That's. That's it. Like, I try and put it all out there. Like in.
In my ideal world, I'd like lots of people to be making ceramics the way I do. Yeah, yeah. There's. There's a lot of People doing ceramics the way I do with doing, like, mugs and that sort of thing and cups, but not many doing it for bonsai yet. But I'm starting to build a small group that is starting to get into it, and I think it's just a matter of time. Yeah.
[00:12:33] Speaker C: That's so cool.
[00:12:34] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:35] Speaker C: Tell me a little bit. How did you learn how to do this?
[00:12:39] Speaker B: So my background is more technology, software, that sort of thing, not art. I don't really see myself as an artist. I think of myself more of a engineer, scientist type person. So my whole process is more along that sort of line. Yeah.
[00:13:01] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:13:01] Speaker B: Yeah. With the whole 3D printing. And we can. I can explain that as much as you want.
[00:13:07] Speaker C: I'm very curious.
[00:13:08] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:13:09] Speaker B: So basically all my pots are designed on a computer. So I take my. I take an idea for what I'd like to see as a pot as a design, and I design that up in my 3D software. I use a program called Rhino3D. What's it called? One more time.
[00:13:31] Speaker C: Rhino3D.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: Rhino3D.
[00:13:32] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: Yeah. So I design a pot in there, and then once I've got the shape, the design that I like, then I effectively cut it up into a few pieces and print those as, like. I guess you'd call it like a mother mold. Like, so that's printed in 3D, printed in plastic.
[00:13:55] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:13:56] Speaker B: And from the. From the plastic. It's a pla. Plastic. From that, I create a plaster mold, and then that. And from my plaster mold, I can. Then I use. I can use a liquid clay to pour into the mold to then create the pot. Yeah, yeah. So it's a. So it's a long process to go from an idea to one pot. It's a long process. Like, it might be two to four weeks to go from an idea to about to have a very. To actually have a finished pot.
[00:14:30] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:30] Speaker B: But then my advantage is I can go from one pot to ten pots a bit quicker.
[00:14:35] Speaker C: Okay. Yeah. So can I repeat your process back to you and tell me if I got. If I understand correctly?
[00:14:41] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:42] Speaker C: So first you design. In using some type of software, you design what you want the pot to look like.
[00:14:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:49] Speaker C: And then you take that Design and you3D print the mold portion. Is that correct?
[00:14:58] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:14:58] Speaker C: Okay.
And.
And then from there, once you have.
[00:15:03] Speaker A: The mold, then you pour the liquid.
[00:15:07] Speaker C: Clay into the mold, and then you fire. And like, from that point, it's more like a traditional bonsai ceramicist.
[00:15:16] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Then you've got your. You've got your finished. You Got your base pot. That's. And then you do your first cook and then you glaze it and you do your second cook, and then you're away. Yeah.
[00:15:27] Speaker C: Nice. Okay.
Really interesting. The 3D printing portion of it. I think that's very. That's genius. And I think I feel like 3D printing is going to be so big in the future. It's kind of newer, but it's growing in popularity on a regular basis. It's.
[00:15:46] Speaker B: It's cool because it means you can do different designs. Like, you can do designs that would traditionally, traditionally be very hard to make. And it also means you can do different things. You can have a different profile at the top of the pot to the bottom of the pot. Like some of my pots will have like a moko style profile to the top rim, but the bottom rim will just be more of a simple oval. And because you can transition from those two different profiles and it just. Yeah, it just opens up so many more possibilities.
[00:16:18] Speaker C: That's so cool.
[00:16:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:16:20] Speaker C: Yeah. I guess you can get more technically perfect, right?
[00:16:25] Speaker B: Yes. Correct.
[00:16:26] Speaker C: Yeah. That is so cool.
[00:16:27] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:16:28] Speaker C: And the 3D printing, I'm very un. Unfamiliar with 3D printing in that whole world.
Are these things that everybody can purchase?
[00:16:38] Speaker B: Yeah. Easy as, like 3D printers now just become cheap. They used to be expensive, but you can pick up a good 3D printer for $300.
[00:16:45] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:16:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:16:46] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:16:46] Speaker B: Yeah. Easy. Easy as. Yeah, yeah.
[00:16:49] Speaker C: And what are your molds actually made of? Like, what is the material that you print?
[00:16:55] Speaker B: So the material I print is plastic, but then you go from plastic to plaster.
[00:17:00] Speaker C: Oh, okay.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: So your mold. So my molds are the same as any traditional mold that pot makers. Makers use.
So it's just a plaster. A plaster material. Because you, because when you. Your plaster mold, the plaster absorb. Absorbs water from your clay to allow the clay to dry out. So then you can pull your. Your pot from the.
From the mold. Yeah.
[00:17:26] Speaker C: Very nice. Very nice. Awesome. Okay, so when you print the.
You print the mold, are you printing just the exterior of the pot and then you pour the ceramic in or is there an interior and exterior area?
[00:17:43] Speaker B: So it's real hard. You in your mind. This was the hardest thing to, to comprehend when I got started because you keep having to reverse. So I kind of print.
It's hard without pictures. But if you. I print a. And obviously people about to see on my Instagram, I print. I print my printers of the finish pot.
[00:18:09] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:18:09] Speaker B: Right. And then I. And then for my first mold and then it's. It reverses to the opposite for the mold design. And then when you put use the clay, it then reverses again back to the finished product. It's real. It's. It was the hardest thing to get my head around because you keep having to, to flip from a mold to the finished product and backwards and forwards. It's real. Yeah, It. It does your hidden. It does my hidden.
[00:18:36] Speaker C: Yeah, that's the trip.
[00:18:37] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because imagine if you have a mold and then your pot's sitting inside that mold. That mold is kind of a reverse of your pot. Yeah, yeah.
[00:18:48] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:18:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:50] Speaker C: Interesting. Okay.
[00:18:51] Speaker B: That's hard to explain.
[00:18:52] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. No.
Now with the clay that you utilize and I am not a ceramic expert by any means. I only study. I study the final product, but not the actual process of creating ceramics.
It seems very liquidy. Is that for. Is it more liquidy inconsistency compared to other clay? Clays? For most.
[00:19:17] Speaker B: Yeah. So yeah. So for my, for my pots, I use a liquid clay. So I take a block of clay later, a normal potter, well, not a traditional pot. I would use like a block of clay you buy from the shop.
And then I dry that out. Right. So I break it up, I dried out, and then I put it in a, basically into a bucket with water and rehydrate it to basically turn it into a, into a liquid. So then I can be pouring that liquid into my mold. And then as the plaster sucks the water out of the clay, you're left. The longer you leave it in the mold, the thicker the wall will be on the pot. So imagine if you poured your liquid into your mold and just left it for a few minutes. Your wall would be super thin and it would just collapse. So you have to get your timing right to get your wall the right thickness. And then, and then because it's dried at the edge, when you pour them all the clay back out, you're left with what has dried. Yeah.
[00:20:21] Speaker C: Very cool.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: That's awesome. Yeah, yeah.
[00:20:24] Speaker C: Nice.
And then I noticed that you finish your pots with hand tools.
[00:20:30] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:20:31] Speaker C: Did you take ceramic classes or anything like that or just.
[00:20:36] Speaker B: Nah. All completely self taught. Yeah, yeah. The only thing I've studied is glazing. But everything else, I've just taught myself how to do it from YouTube, Instagram, watching other people and just truckloads of trial and error. Yeah. In New Zealand we kind of. We do everything ourselves. You know, like if you need to fix something, you fix it yourself. If you need, you learn how to do it. Yeah. It's just sort of like The New Zealand way. So I've just taught myself how to do it. Yeah, I probably could have done it a lot quicker if I had someone teach me a lot of the. A lot of stuff, but it's not as much fun, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:21:15] Speaker C: Totally awesome. Okay. And then what type of. What type of kiln do you use?
[00:21:19] Speaker B: So electric. Yeah, so electric kiln. Because with my glazing, I'm using that Aribi crystalline glaze. So with my electric kiln, you can still do it in gas, but the price to buy a digital controlled gas kiln is just. Is crazy expensive, whereas electric's a lot more affordable. And you have the digital controllers, so I can run specific firing cycles with certain temperatures, certain holds, all that sort of stuff.
[00:21:49] Speaker C: Yeah, fantastic. Yeah. That's so cool.
[00:21:51] Speaker B: Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah.
[00:21:53] Speaker C: I love your glazes. You really have come a long way in a very short amount of time. I see a lot of koio influence. Would you. Would you agree with that?
[00:22:03] Speaker B: Koio is my. My favorite potter. Yeah. So I take inspiration from the Japanese potters and just the work that they are able to do. Back in the 80s 90s, like, they were making crazy good stuff, and you just don't see anyone. Well, not. You do see, but you don't see many people outside of Japan making those types of pots. So that's why. That's what I want to do. Like, I'm. I'm super niche. Like, obviously, I make bonsai pots, but then I make deciduous bonsai pots, and they're all in those sort of blues, greens, types of glazes. So, like, I'm like, niche within a niche inside another niche, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:22:43] Speaker C: Would you expand outside of that, or you like staying in your niche? In your niche?
[00:22:47] Speaker A: In your niche?
[00:22:48] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I like it. I like it. Like, I'm going to bring in some more colors. I want to get in some yellows, obviously, I've got my purples, but I don't have any plans to get into the browns because there's already, like, so many, like, crazy good ceramics people out there making, like, awesome, you know, unglazed pots. Like, I don't need to get into that market as well. Yeah, yeah.
[00:23:10] Speaker C: Very cool.
[00:23:10] Speaker B: Sticking my channel.
[00:23:14] Speaker C: So speaking of Japanese potters, we have some here at the show, and I think you were telling me you got to hang out with them a bit.
[00:23:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that's been crazy. Yeah, that's just.
It's just been, like, the highlight of my trip. So I managed to go out to Dinner with them last night, talk to them about just ceramics in general. Bonsai pots, glazes, all that sort of stuff. They're just. They're just amazing. Yeah. Yeah. And then. Yeah.
[00:23:44] Speaker C: So which. Do you remember their names? Because I'm forgetting off the top of my head.
[00:23:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Kakusan and Ecosan. Yeah.
[00:23:52] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:23:52] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. That's super cool. Yeah.
[00:23:55] Speaker C: That is incredible.
[00:23:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:23:57] Speaker C: Anything you can tell me about your conversations at dinner, like, any interesting points brought up or.
[00:24:05] Speaker B: Anything come to mind?
Just general stuff.
One thing that definitely interests me about the Japanese guys is they really embrace the way I make my pots.
Even though they're super traditional, they're real into technology, and they really embrace technology. Like, they love the whole concept of the 3D printing. Yeah, they're actually really into it. And they gave me some. They gave me some tips that I can. They kind of like. We kind of, like, critiqued some of my pots, which was real cool. So they gave me some tips on how I could do my feet a little bit different, how I could position some of my drainage holes a little bit different. So, like, it was amazing. And then, like, today, super, super lucky that I've been working with them this morning to create a new chop, like to make a mark for my pot. So that's going to be super cool.
[00:25:01] Speaker C: Yeah. So with the Japanese.
[00:25:04] Speaker B: Yeah. So they've designed me a couple of kanji symbols.
[00:25:07] Speaker C: That's right.
[00:25:08] Speaker B: To use on my pots.
[00:25:09] Speaker C: So cool. Yeah.
[00:25:10] Speaker B: And I've kind of, like, endorsed it because I. Yeah, I talk to them a lot about my signature. And like, I say, I don't mind whether we put this part in or not kind of thing, but, like, I was saying to them, English letters are real boring, you know, like, my signature. My name is just rk.
[00:25:28] Speaker E: Right.
[00:25:28] Speaker B: And I saw. Talking to them a lot about. And they said, oh, you should. You know, we'll. We'll do your Japanese kanji symbol. I'm like, but I can't do. I can't have Japanese kanji symbol because I'm not Japanese. And they're like, no, no, you can have that. You know? And I was like, really? They're like, yeah, you definitely can. So they. Between. There was four Japanese guys, they worked. They talked for a long time working it out to come up with the.
And for the Japanese pots, they're saying you really need to have just two symbols. So my name is, in Japanese is Richardo.
[00:26:00] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:26:01] Speaker B: So they're like, that's Richard. It's like three. So they shortened it down to Chado and so they designed up the kanji symbols for chardo.
[00:26:08] Speaker C: That's so rad. I love that.
[00:26:10] Speaker B: Yeah. And they drew it on one of my pots for me, and then they gave. And they've obviously given me the drawing and I've got that. So I'm going to go back home and design it up in my software and 3D print a stamp.
[00:26:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:23] Speaker B: Using my pots.
[00:26:24] Speaker C: Oh.
[00:26:24] Speaker B: And they just think that's crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:26:27] Speaker C: Wow. What a. What a story. What an experience. I feel like just that part makes it worth your trip almost.
[00:26:34] Speaker B: It's like the highlight of my trip because, like. Yeah, like this, like, what you use for the stamp and how you mark your pots is something that's, like, I think about a lot. Yeah. So it's just, like, highlight on my trip. Yeah, yeah. Makes the whole thing worthwhile. Yeah, yeah.
[00:26:47] Speaker C: You're telling me you would like to go to Tokoname somewhere?
[00:26:50] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they've invited me to Tokonami, so there you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They want me to get some pots ready to enter into the GUFU 10, and they'll support me helping with that, which is just crazy.
[00:27:05] Speaker C: Cool.
[00:27:05] Speaker B: So they're like, come. Come to Japan, come to Tokonami, come to the GAFU 10. And I'm like, man, this is just, like, so cool. Yeah, yeah.
[00:27:13] Speaker C: Incredible. Yeah. Incredible. Has anyone from New Zealand entered apart into those shows?
[00:27:18] Speaker B: Nah.
[00:27:19] Speaker C: Nah.
[00:27:20] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:27:20] Speaker C: What an opportunity.
[00:27:22] Speaker B: Yeah. It's just mind blowing, man. Like, you know, like. And that's the thing. You gotta feel like you got to get out of your comfort zone, you know? That's why I'm here. Get out of New Zealand. I mean, New Zealand's awesome, but, like, it's. You gotta go out into the rest of the world and stuff, you know?
[00:27:37] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[00:27:38] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:27:40] Speaker C: Are. Do you plan to stay in New Zealand for a long time?
[00:27:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:27:44] Speaker C: That's your home?
[00:27:44] Speaker B: Yeah, that's my home. That's where I live.
I live in the town. The same town where I've lived my whole entire life. Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Yes. Yeah.
[00:27:53] Speaker C: How old are you?
[00:27:55] Speaker B: Be. 43. Oh, nice. Yeah.
[00:27:57] Speaker C: Awesome. You look. You look young. In a good way.
[00:28:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, very nice.
[00:28:03] Speaker C: I'm 40.
[00:28:04] Speaker B: So perfect. Perfect age. Yeah.
[00:28:07] Speaker C: Sweet.
[00:28:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:28:09] Speaker C: Any. Any other potters here that you admire or kind of checked out their work?
[00:28:15] Speaker B: Definitely. Lana's pots. Her pots. The new stand, she sit up next to me. Her pots are amazing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's got some cool. Some really cool stuff. Yeah. And obviously Nile's pots are just like, Crazy good. I spent heaps of time talking to. Talking to him about his. His pots, how he makes his pots.
[00:28:35] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:28:35] Speaker B: How he glazes his pots. He's super cool guy. Yeah. Spend a lot of time talking to him. And he's also invited me up to Portland. Portland.
[00:28:44] Speaker C: Yeah, Portland.
[00:28:46] Speaker B: To go check out his process and his studio and that sort of thing. So I kind of need to plan another trip back over here. Yes.
[00:28:54] Speaker C: That's awesome.
[00:28:55] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah, Very cool. Yeah, I can't do the size that he can do. Like, his ability to make the pot so that he does at his size is just mind blowing to me. Like, it's so good. Yeah. Yes.
[00:29:06] Speaker C: Speaking of that, I guess in the Next, you know, five, 10 years, are there any particular goals maybe that you have with this, or do you envision yourself doing anything differently?
[00:29:19] Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. Like, size is the thing I really want to work on. Like, size. I'm just experimenting with the. Using my mold design and my molding techniques to combine it with the way the Japanese build a lot of their pots using their press molds. So where they're taking a mold and they're pressing clay into the mold. So that's something I'm going to start just being. Starting to work on now. So sort of like combining my 3D stuff with some of the traditional press, press molding way of making pots to then try and make bigger pots. Because by doing that, I can. I can use clays that have got, like, a more groggy type clay, which holds its shape better. Because when you go to a bigger pot, it's hard to keep the shape. Like, it's all good if you make a big pot, but if it's all, like, wonky and, like, ugly, it's not forgotten. No good, you know, so that by doing that technique, it'll allow me to, like, expand out my process and hopefully get into some slightly larger, larger stuff. Not crazy. I'm not going to go crazy big. Like, not as big as, like, now makes, because I need to sell about a ship because all my stuff has to ship. But I'd love to produce some of my glazes on just slightly bigger than what I can do at the moment.
[00:30:35] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:30:36] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:36] Speaker C: What's it probably the biggest size you can do now about?
[00:30:41] Speaker B: I. I think in centimeters, so about 30 centimeters wide. So is that about 12, 12 inches?
[00:30:47] Speaker C: I need to run another.
[00:30:49] Speaker B: It's about 12 inches. So, yeah, I'd like to. I'd like to get up to that sort of 40, 50 centimeter mark. Yeah. 1620, 20 inches wide. That just. That's just in a whole nother level. Yeah, that sort of size, yeah.
[00:31:02] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah, Very cool. Well, really appreciate your time. Your glazes and containers are so cool and I love the process that you're doing and I'm so happy that you came out and we're a vendor at this show.
[00:31:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:16] Speaker C: And it was absolutely awesome to have you on. Anything else you want to tell the listeners?
[00:31:23] Speaker B: Just want to say everyone in the States is super nice. Like, I've met so many cool guys, so many cool people. Like, everyone's super nice. It's just been. It's just been sweet to meet everyone. Like, I know heaps of people through Instagram, Facebook. It's about to put like, you know, names to faces and actually talk to everyone in person. Just so cool. Yeah, just everyone's been super nice and it's just been like a lot of fun.
[00:31:42] Speaker C: Yeah, that's awesome.
[00:31:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:43] Speaker C: And work it. What's your Instagram handle?
[00:31:46] Speaker B: So all my stuff is just Richard Kearney nz.
[00:31:49] Speaker C: And would you spell that for us, please?
[00:31:50] Speaker B: R I, C, H, A, R, D. So Richard and then Kearney's K, E, A, R, N, E, Y, nz.
[00:31:57] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah. Hey, thank you so much for being on. I appreciate it.
[00:32:01] Speaker B: Sweet, man.
[00:32:02] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:32:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Not real cool.
[00:32:03] Speaker C: Yeah. Thank you.
So would you give me a quick introduction on yourself?
[00:32:12] Speaker A: Yeah, sure. I'm Bob Pressler. I'm the owner of Kimora Bonsai Nursery in Castillo, California. Also the president, California Bonsai Society.
Buns like has been a passion and obsession and a passion and an obsession just a little bit closer since 1968.
[00:32:31] Speaker C: Wow.
I was.
[00:32:33] Speaker A: I saw my first trees when I was 10.
[00:32:35] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:32:36] Speaker A: And I've been obsessed ever since.
[00:32:39] Speaker C: That's incredible.
And so what does your primary business look like these days?
[00:32:47] Speaker A: These days, primarily it's education and selling more finished or more advanced pre bonsai material.
[00:32:56] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:32:58] Speaker A: But education is my main focus.
[00:33:00] Speaker C: That's great.
[00:33:01] Speaker A: We have as many classes as I can, so.
[00:33:04] Speaker C: Yeah. Who are some of the most recent artists you've had?
[00:33:13] Speaker A: Michael Roberts is a regular monthly class there. Daniel Deep House is their monthly beginners class there.
We've had Yana Kagan there. We've had Bjorn there. Jonas does a biannual black pine workshop.
Will Battle will be here this spring.
[00:33:34] Speaker C: I think I reached out to you about a day with him, actually.
[00:33:36] Speaker A: Yeah, I think he did.
Kaz Cassidy from England has been there.
[00:33:46] Speaker C: Who else?
[00:33:46] Speaker A: What other?
I don't know. Every. Pretty much every visiting artist.
Adam Toss inside.
[00:33:54] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:33:55] Speaker A: Julian.
[00:33:59] Speaker C: I watched Your demo with Bjorn? Well, the. The demo that Bjorn and Janek did recently.
[00:34:04] Speaker A: Oh, for Daichi.
[00:34:06] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:34:07] Speaker A: That was cool. That was a good demo.
[00:34:09] Speaker C: That was fantastic.
[00:34:10] Speaker A: I was really interested watching the two of them work together because they have very different styles, but they work pretty well together.
[00:34:17] Speaker C: It sure seemed like. It seemed like they've been doing it for a long time.
[00:34:19] Speaker A: Well, they've been friends for a really long time, but I think Bjorn said that this was the first time they ever really worked on a tree together. Yeah, that was kind of interesting.
[00:34:29] Speaker C: Wow. Well, I feel like some people just have natural chemistry together.
[00:34:34] Speaker A: Yeah, definitely.
[00:34:36] Speaker C: Stand on this side. Sir Andrew Robson's giving a demo right by us now.
[00:34:45] Speaker A: Very nice.
[00:34:45] Speaker C: And I can edit anything out. Just sending a little tool.
Yeah.
[00:34:50] Speaker A: Sometimes I need to be edited.
F bombs get dropped every once in a while.
It's different, but it's fine. It's not the same one, but it'll work.
Oh, no, that's big team.
[00:35:06] Speaker C: I'm doing great. How about you?
Great. Awesome. That's.
[00:35:11] Speaker A: We've had a Tomo hero, Musumi from Japan.
[00:35:16] Speaker C: Okay. As a visiting artist once just a bonsai professional from.
[00:35:20] Speaker A: He's a. The Shogun master in Japan. He was. I don't know if he still is, but past president of the Shohin Association.
[00:35:28] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:35:28] Speaker A: It was kind of interesting the day he was here doing a workshop. It was in my old place and he's doing a workshop. There's 10 people in there working on trees and all of a sudden there's all these sirens and helicopters and stuff. What the hell?
[00:35:42] Speaker C: What?
[00:35:43] Speaker A: And apparently there was a car chase that ended right in front of my nursery and the guy jumped out of the car and ran into that next door. They were doing a development. They were building I think seven or eight houses and he ran into there. So the police are surrounding the place.
Helicopter is so close overhead that it's blowing leaves off my roof into the workshop.
And for hero is like, what's going on?
This is the police. Put your weapons down and come out with your hands up before we release the dogs. He was like, what the hell is happening here?
Wow, that was pretty interesting. Yes, I am.
[00:36:26] Speaker C: What an intro into the US Yeah.
[00:36:29] Speaker A: Luckily you'd been here before, but it was pretty eye opening, I think.
[00:36:34] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
Well, I think that's so important that you're bringing so many great bonsai professionals and education.
I mean, I think that's really what we need.
[00:36:47] Speaker A: You know, I'm never going to be like a world class bonsai Artist, you know, I'm okay.
[00:36:55] Speaker C: You're good. You know.
[00:36:57] Speaker A: Well, thank you. But, you know, I'm never going to be like, you know, up there. But I do have an opportunity to leave my staff on the bonsai world by providing all these educational opportunities.
And when I became president of California Bullseye Society, that was one of my. Really, one of my goals was, you know, we started this visiting artist program where four times a year we bring in an international bullseye artist. And I try to bring in people that are not quite, like, well known and traveling around the world, but. But still have the skills that they should be.
[00:37:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:37:36] Speaker A: And it's a good opportunity for them, you know, plus, it's Los Angeles, so, you know, everybody. I don't know why, but everybody wants to go to Los Angeles.
So, you know, it's a really good thing that we get to do.
[00:37:50] Speaker C: That's fantastic.
[00:37:51] Speaker A: And so it's good for. For the local bonsai community. It's also good for the artists because it gives them more exposure and a chance to travel to LA and stuff like that. So, you know, that's kind of where I see my, you know, imprint on bonsai being.
[00:38:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:38:10] Speaker A: Is that kind of stuff?
[00:38:11] Speaker C: Well, that's a very important role and we're very lucky to have you so in. Yeah.
Would you tell me a little bit about the move with your nursery from your original location to the new spot?
[00:38:25] Speaker A: It was kind of wasn't something I really planned.
[00:38:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:38:29] Speaker A: One day my wife was talking to a friend of hers whose husband is a realtor, and he was saying, you know, that piece of property is gold mine. Yeah, you should think about selling it. So she came home all excited, and I was like, I don't really want to sell. But she was, like, so excited. It was one of those things where I said, all right, I'm going to just kick the can down the road. I said, all right, we'll list it, but I want a million cents. I'm not taking any less.
Nobody was ever going to give me a main six. I just knew it wasn't going to happen. So I was like, it's cool. You know, ultimately somebody did.
[00:39:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:08] Speaker A: And I was like, okay. So we had to sell.
[00:39:11] Speaker C: And a developer.
[00:39:15] Speaker A: He says, no, but I think he is a developer.
[00:39:18] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:18] Speaker A: That was the only reason to spend that kind of money on that property.
[00:39:23] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:23] Speaker A: I mean, it was a big piece of land in the middle of San Fernando Valley. It was a half acre of flat land.
[00:39:28] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:29] Speaker A: So, you know, and the guy next door to me, the Same exact lot. He put seven or eight townhouses on them and sold them all for in excess of 700,000. So, you know, the guy will make his money.
[00:39:42] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:44] Speaker A: But I was like, I was kind of committed at that point. So we sold. We were looking for a place and I realized I made a mistake.
We're gonna have to spend every penny we make to buy a new place.
And that wasn't what I wanted to do. You know, I'm 65. I don't want another mortgage.
So I was kind of regretting it a little bit.
[00:40:09] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:40:10] Speaker A: And then my wife found this piece of property and to stay at that, you know, was way less than anything comparable anywhere in the city.
It's literally 26 miles from my old place. But it might as well be a different. It feels like a different country.
[00:40:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:40:27] Speaker A: You know, it's like it's out in the country. My neighbors all have horses and goats. You know, instead of waking up to helicopters and sirens, I wake up to roosters and donkeys and hawks and know, owls at night, coyotes. So, you know, people drive down the street, wave to each other.
For my garden, it's awesome because the house and the garden are totally separate.
[00:40:51] Speaker C: Yeah, you. You can go in. Yeah, sorry.
[00:40:53] Speaker A: The house and garden are completely separated.
[00:40:55] Speaker C: Uhuh.
[00:40:57] Speaker A: You know, the house. Cut the house and it's got a garden. There's a wall and a step down into the bonsai garden. So it's perfect, you know, setup as far as I'm concerned. It's just the right amount of size, just enough space. I don't want any more space because still obsessed with this thing. So, you know, the more space I have, the more trees I want to put in there to fill it up.
And you know, I just downsize from almost 12, 12,000 trees to 400 trees.
[00:41:27] Speaker E: Wow.
[00:41:28] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:41:28] Speaker A: So big difference.
[00:41:30] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:41:30] Speaker A: You know, not growing material, it's.
[00:41:32] Speaker C: I feel a little bit bad for.
[00:41:33] Speaker A: The bonsai beginners because I was one of the few people in LA that were growing a lot of young material and I'm not doing it anymore. But you know, there are other people picking up the slack and, you know, other sources.
[00:41:47] Speaker C: So I don't feel that totally sounds like such a better vibe for a bonsai garden.
[00:41:55] Speaker A: Oh, it really is.
[00:41:57] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:41:57] Speaker A: Um, you know, and the, the first place I bought it, it was already a nursery. Hey, Chase. Um, so I kind of just added on to what was there. So it was never really what I wanted.
[00:42:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:42:11] Speaker A: You know, it was always a nursery and not really a garden.
[00:42:14] Speaker C: Uh huh.
[00:42:15] Speaker A: And this is not that. This is a garden, you know, that's fantastic. Which is. You know, I still got a ways to go, but we've got a really good foundation and I'm really happy with that.
[00:42:28] Speaker C: The pictures you've posted are. Look really nice. You did a great job with it.
[00:42:32] Speaker A: You know, we're not all that far. You should come down and visit sometime.
[00:42:35] Speaker C: I would really like to. Yeah.
[00:42:37] Speaker A: Come down the coast and shoot across the 126.
[00:42:40] Speaker C: Thank you. I absolutely would love. I will take you up on that. Yeah.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: And actually, what we're thinking about this, talking about education, if you're interested in coming down, doing a workshop someday.
[00:42:55] Speaker C: Maybe about the second part. Excuse me.
I would love to come visit you, but I don't know, I just. I haven't done a whole lot of workshops or anything like that yet, but. But maybe.
[00:43:08] Speaker A: But you should be.
[00:43:10] Speaker C: Oh, thank you. Appreciate it.
[00:43:11] Speaker A: Yeah. Like you said, we. We need a lot more opportunities for education.
[00:43:18] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:43:18] Speaker A: And you know, there's a lot of local people like yourself. I mean, look at your trees, you know, I mean, yeah, you have a great teacher, but you're doing the work.
So you have a lot of knowledge that you can impart.
[00:43:33] Speaker C: Yeah. And. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Big compliment.
Definitely want to come see you. And you know, I. I'm all about spreading education, so. Yeah, so we'll talk about it.
Sounds good. But.
So can you give me your thoughts on the show?
[00:43:55] Speaker A: Oh, I think it's incredible. Sorry. But no, I love it.
It really is.
I'm blown away.
[00:44:03] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:44:04] Speaker A: You know, the first one I was pretty much blown away by. And this just is over and above that.
[00:44:11] Speaker C: Let's jump in. That's fantastic.
[00:44:15] Speaker A: Everything I say is my own personal opinion. I don't want anybody to think that this is like the be all, end all of things. In the first show, I thought there was maybe two trees that I kind of looked at and said, why are they here in this show? There's not a question about any of them.
[00:44:33] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:44:33] Speaker A: Every single tree that's here belongs here.
And there's just some amazing trees. The whole setup. You know, the display area, the vending area is just.
Every bit is good, if not in some ways even better than national show.
I think this venue is way nicer than that one. Sorry, Bill.
But you know, it's just. And this is only second time they've done it.
So looking. You know what.
What we have to look forward to in the future is just an amazing thing. And I think this is gonna really, really help step up the quality of bonsai on the west Coast. You know, for years, the west coast was kind of like the bonsai mecca, you know, and California in particular. And somewhere around the mid-80s, early 90s, it kind of just slide away because it didn't really evolve, and bonsai as an art did.
And that's changing, and this is a big step in helping that change.
[00:45:42] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:45:43] Speaker A: You know, I mean, for people to be able to come in and see this caliber and quality of tree, it's really eye opening, you know, so I'm super happy to be part of it. Yeah. Proud to be a sponsor. Excited that I have a tree that was, you know, accepted to it twice. Yeah. So that's off to, you know, Eric and.
[00:46:09] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, Excuse me. We're extremely lucky. Yeah.
Extremely lucky to have Eric, Jonas and Andrew.
[00:46:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:22] Speaker C: I mean, just shout out to them for sure.
[00:46:25] Speaker A: Absolutely. I mean, and just think of the risks that they took doing this, you know, especially the first one. They had no clue what was going to happen. You know, they had dreams and hopes, but there was no telling how successful it was going to be.
And, you know, just the fact that, you know, they have this many, this quality trees is a testament to them.
[00:46:51] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:46:51] Speaker A: That, you know, they got all these people to get these trees ready and get them in here.
[00:46:56] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:46:56] Speaker A: And, you know, Jonas, he just thrives on improving. Bullseye.
[00:47:02] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:47:02] Speaker A: I think Jonas is a real gift to the American bulze scene.
[00:47:08] Speaker C: Couldn't have said it better.
[00:47:09] Speaker A: He really is. So, yes, we have a.
[00:47:14] Speaker C: We have a bit more SoCal representation, it seems.
[00:47:16] Speaker A: Yeah, I was really happy to see that. You know, last time I think there was only three or four of us, and it was a little like, oh, but, you know, there's a good handful, at least 20, 25 people here, you know, from SoCal visiting, and we've got, I think, let's see, maybe seven or eight or 10 trees. That's from SoCal.
[00:47:40] Speaker C: Yeah. So I love to see that. Now, I was kind of surprised there weren't as many last year, and I'm happy to see that there's more.
[00:47:48] Speaker A: I'm not sure why there weren't as many. I mean, part of it is there's still that old school kind of.
I don't know if mentality is the right word, but a lot of SoCal is still locked into, like, the John Naka method of teaching and doing things and stuff like that. And John was amazing. You know, he was one of my. One of my teachers, and he was an amazing guy, but he had certain ideas that he felt strongly about, and one of them was that there should not be a competition. So I know for sure there was a couple people that didn't put trees in last time because of that, they felt that it should not be a competition.
And I think maybe not having a cash prize this time allowed them to get beyond that because two of them have trees here. So. Yeah, good.
Sort of kind of.
[00:48:52] Speaker C: Awesome recording a podcast right now. But you're.
[00:48:55] Speaker A: You're on it.
[00:48:56] Speaker C: You're on it. How are you doing?
Speaking of SoCal B. Yeah.
[00:49:04] Speaker A: And the fact that, you know, a SoCal tree won best in show. Go SoCal. Go Dodgers.
Might as well take that opportunity when I have it.
[00:49:17] Speaker C: Sure, sure.
Well, that's fantastic.
I hope we see more SoCal in the future.
[00:49:25] Speaker A: I think you will.
[00:49:26] Speaker C: Yeah. Great.
[00:49:27] Speaker A: I think that my hope, and I see it slowly happening for years, there was this kind of weird rift between Northern California and Southern California.
[00:49:40] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:49:40] Speaker A: And the funny thing about it is there's nobody alive that knows what it was.
You know, I mean, seriously, there's nobody left alive that knows what actually happened. You know, there's a bunch of stories on both sides of the state, and for years, it kind of caused a divide between North Northern California and Southern California, and that's lessening, and this goes a long way to helping that.
[00:50:07] Speaker C: Yeah. If.
[00:50:09] Speaker A: If I could do anything or suggest anything different, I would like to see.
[00:50:14] Speaker C: This possibly move to SoCal version.
[00:50:18] Speaker A: You know, not annually, not biannually, but, you know, once in a while, like, kind of. You know, unless they keep this venue permanently.
[00:50:26] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:50:27] Speaker A: If they. If they're changing the venues, it'd be nice to kind of, like, maybe move it down south a little bit.
[00:50:32] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:50:32] Speaker A: And keep it, you know, back up north.
But I think it's a really unifying factor in the bunsite community. And, you know, you can see the proof of it just by seeing the people here today.
[00:50:46] Speaker C: Totally.
[00:50:47] Speaker A: You know, and not just California. I mean, there are people here from all over the country. There's a big contingent of people from the east Coast.
[00:50:54] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:50:55] Speaker A: You know, Chase Rose, AIDS here. He's like one of the last really old school, old school bonsai guys, you know?
[00:51:01] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:51:02] Speaker A: And Chase was the first person to study in Japan back in the early 60s.
[00:51:07] Speaker C: Was he really?
[00:51:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:51:08] Speaker C: That's so cool. So was he before Bill Vanis? Yeah. Oh, wow.
[00:51:13] Speaker A: Yeah, before Bill.
[00:51:14] Speaker C: That's. That's awesome.
[00:51:16] Speaker A: So he was literally like the last of the old school. Old school Guys.
And you know, it was really cool to see him. And there's a whole group of them from the east coast here, so. Yeah, it's one of the things I love about bonsai is the community.
[00:51:31] Speaker C: Uhhuh.
[00:51:32] Speaker A: You know, and how unifying it is. There's also a lot of BS and you know, politics or whatever that occurs anytime you get a group of people together. But beyond that, the bones like community is just amazing. It's more like a family than anything else.
I've been in business for 30 years.
[00:51:53] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:51:54] Speaker A: I've got two bounce chats in 30 years.
[00:51:57] Speaker C: That's pretty good.
[00:51:58] Speaker A: One of them was from somebody that spent too much money at a convention and didn't realize it and called me up before the bank did and said, hey, that check's gonna bounce. Will you hold onto it for a couple days? And then redeposit. And the other one was some seventy something year old little old lady wrote me a stolen check for an $85 tree.
[00:52:24] Speaker C: Really?
[00:52:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:27] Speaker C: Interesting. Okay.
[00:52:28] Speaker A: I mean, I don't know of any other business where somebody could say in 30 years I've gotten two bad traps.
[00:52:34] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:52:35] Speaker A: You know, and only one of them really counted.
[00:52:38] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. We're not going to claim the little old lady bonsai thief.
[00:52:42] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, whatever. That's. I laugh about that more than anything.
[00:52:47] Speaker C: Totally. Totally.
[00:52:49] Speaker A: And I'm happy It wasn't an 850 tree.
[00:52:52] Speaker C: Yeah. Because it easily could have been fortunate.
[00:52:57] Speaker A: Is this a fire alarm and nobody's paying attention to it?
[00:53:00] Speaker C: You know, yesterday it went off and they just said it was just a test.
I mean, I'm assuming that's what it is again, but.
[00:53:12] Speaker A: Well, no, Interesting. Yeah, but. And the vending area is amazing.
[00:53:21] Speaker C: How many vendors do they have something?
[00:53:23] Speaker A: I forget the number, but there's a large number of them. Way more than last time.
[00:53:28] Speaker C: Huh.
[00:53:29] Speaker A: And sorry, you can't bring that tree in the. In here. We got to keep the tree separate.
[00:53:34] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, go outside. Right over there.
Nice to see you, Greg.
[00:53:41] Speaker A: I'm hoping it's just a test. Apparently it happened yesterday too, so. But people don't seem to be panicking, so I'm not going to panic. Yeah, I'm not going to panic too much, but see that I can podcast and security at the same time.
[00:53:58] Speaker C: We are multitasking here right now.
I don't think that this alarm is going to pick up in the podcast. These are pretty good at noise canceling and I can edit it out actually, but it might a little bit. I'm not sure.
[00:54:13] Speaker A: How do you do this when you do it remotely?
[00:54:16] Speaker C: So usually I just do a video version. So it's like a. Like, I use Riverside. It's called. It's like zoom. Okay. Yeah. And so I just have a mic and do it from the laptops. Yeah. I sure hope they stop with these alarms, though, soon.
[00:54:32] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a little.
It's kind of funny that people are just ignoring it.
[00:54:38] Speaker C: Yeah.
Did you purchase this?
[00:54:41] Speaker A: No, I think Doyle just did.
[00:54:42] Speaker C: Sweet. Is that a NOW container?
[00:54:48] Speaker A: He makes some pretty amazing pots.
[00:54:50] Speaker C: Oh, I love his stuff. Yeah.
Oh, okay. We're going outside.
Maybe we can pick this up later.
[00:54:59] Speaker A: All right, well, I'll be around. I'll be around all day tomorrow, so.
[00:55:04] Speaker C: Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you so much.
[00:55:08] Speaker B: Really, really appreciate that.
[00:55:13] Speaker C: Recording. Nice.
[00:55:15] Speaker E: Here we are.
[00:55:16] Speaker C: Cool. How you doing, man? I couldn't even get over too many customers coming over.
[00:55:21] Speaker E: Yeah, it's been really good. It's been out. Probably one of the best experiences I had selling at any venue. It's massive. There's a ton of people here. A lot of interest in trees and potware and wire and. Yeah, I think it's been really good.
[00:55:41] Speaker C: Awesome.
[00:55:41] Speaker E: Stoked.
[00:55:42] Speaker C: Would you give me an introduction? Introduction on yourself?
[00:55:45] Speaker E: Okay. Yeah. So Matthew Walker started Bonjee Bonsai a couple years ago. I live in a valley area. They want to call it Valley Bonsai. And I came across the term banchi, means valley or basin. And I started off because I had way too many trees. I had a lot of collective material, and people started buying them. And I thought, hey, I gotta start a business. And I approached my teacher, who is Boone, and I said, hey, this is my idea for my. This nursery. There's nothing in the East Bay besides Jonas down in Alameda and someplace up in Sacramento. And I was like, there's nothing in between now. And I want to. I want to, you know, bridge that gap. And I showed him my business plan. He was like, great idea. Go for it.
[00:56:33] Speaker C: Fantastic.
[00:56:33] Speaker E: Yeah. So that's how Banchu Bonsai started. I started doing bonsai.
Well, I was introduced about 17 years old, and I was at the national arboretum in Washington, D.C., where I grew up. And I just fell in love with it. And I like the art form.
I. Yeah, I lived in dc, I lived in the city, but we were always in the mountains, always in the hills. So I have a fondness for the trees. DC's covered in trees.
The cherry blossoms are incredible. You walk the city and it's just trees everywhere, old oaks, and it's just really Great. So it's a combination of both and I just fall in love with it. And that's kind of where I've been, you know, been a tree guy since I was young. And then, like I said, it's introduced at the Ping Jing Museum and other things happen, you know, I skateboarded, snowboarded, girls school, joined the army. Once I was out of the army, I landed in California and I had two trees with me, and two became 40, and 40 became way too many. So like everyone else, you know, you have a. You have quantity over quality. And I. I learned that very swiftly when I joined with Boone, and Boone told me all my trees were garbage and I need to get rid of all of them. So I was like, okay.
So I sold whatever I could and I bought one good tree and that's how it all started.
[00:57:56] Speaker C: Fantastic, man.
[00:57:57] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:57:58] Speaker C: And so tell me about your business a bit. What do you sell?
[00:58:01] Speaker E: I sell collecting material.
I was collecting oaks for a long time, but I kept getting poison oak. You're aware of this? You collect. You got some poison oak as well during collect. But I would get it so bad, I have to go to the dock. So I stopped collecting oaks. Actually, the first tree I ever collected was an oak. And I love these live oaks, these coastal live oaks. They're way different than the east coast oaks. We have a lot of Sierra juniper, some lodge pole, and I used to be able to collect olives because I live not too far from an olive grove farm. And they would seed outside their property on the side of the road, and I would collect these little olives and. But they're all gone, unfortunately.
[00:58:45] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:58:45] Speaker E: So mostly yamadori from the Sierra, and.
And next weekend I'm going in the desert to go collect Californias. I got invited to go down to someone's property and they asked me to teach them. So I'm going to teach them and they're going to allow me to dig some trees. It's not the best time of the year because there's no rain down there right now. So, you know, we're going to be very selective on what we're going to take because of root system.
[00:59:10] Speaker C: Maybe do some scouting and come back or something.
[00:59:13] Speaker A: Or I could definitely scout.
[00:59:14] Speaker E: Yeah, for sure there'll be some scouting if I don't grab anything. But, you know, since it's private property, it's. It's gonna. It's gonna be, you know, it's basically invite only. So I mean, that you can run down there.
I'm just gonna run down there. And start taking trees or anything.
[00:59:32] Speaker C: Fantastic.
[00:59:32] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:59:33] Speaker C: I'm really impressed with the Sierras that you have here for sale.
[00:59:36] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:59:37] Speaker C: Is it hard to part with them? Sometimes.
[00:59:39] Speaker E: Well, this one here, its name is Kodaba.
I really don't want to sell it, so it's priced extremely high. But if someone offered me that, I would part ways with it.
But no, there are a few that I keep for myself, but there are many that I do sell to keep my business going. So I kneeled copper wire. And right now it's extremely expensive. So if I can sell a collected tree and that money goes back into buying copper wire that everyone needs for. For shaping their. Their conifers, then that's what I'll do for sure. Yeah. So, yes, it is hard to part. It is hard. I do have seller's remorse. You know, I have a client who owns a couple of my trees and I'm fortunate. I get to work on them. But every time I work on them, just like, what I saw this.
[01:00:29] Speaker C: This stuff.
[01:00:30] Speaker E: This is a. I can't. It's going to be an expo in two years. It is.
[01:00:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:00:35] Speaker E: Like, it's a masterpiece. I'm like, oh, my God. And I'm like, hey, would you ever. And he's like, nope, not like, yeah, totally get it.
[01:00:42] Speaker C: So you sold one to the last Pacific Bonsai Expo. You sold one to Ryan Neal, right?
[01:00:47] Speaker E: Yeah, Ryan Neal. He bought one at the expo and.
[01:00:50] Speaker C: Really nice one.
[01:00:51] Speaker E: Very nice one.
[01:00:52] Speaker C: It's like 7,000 something.
[01:00:54] Speaker E: Yeah, you know, we don't. We're not that top price and stuff, but it was interesting. Like, that tree came out of a section of the Sierra where a giant fire went through.
So I'd like to think I saved that tree from destruction of a wildfire, but. Yeah, But Ryan took it up in the mountains. I think it's back to nature series with it. And I think he's. I think when he passed it on, someone else bought it off of him.
[01:01:23] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:01:24] Speaker E: Yeah. Very cool.
[01:01:24] Speaker C: Let's move on. Yeah, that was a absolutely phenomenal tree.
[01:01:29] Speaker E: And that one, I was like, I'm probably not going to sell this. I'll just take it in for a wow factor, see what happens, you know? And it was funny. I took it out of the van and I put on my cart and some like, instantly these two guys walked up like, hey, you selling it? I was like, yeah. And I told them how. How much? And I was like, it's on the price. And they're like, oh.
And as I'm walking down through the Expo. Um, my buddy Vince. Vince Halbuck was like. Had his hands up near, like, matt, like, what? And I'm like. I'm like, what? Ben saw my mouth like, what? And he's like. He points like, look behind you. And as I'm walking down the expo, carrying it on the cart, there's like, six dudes fingering through it, you know, and they're all looking through the tree, you know, waiting. And I said, guys, wait. I'll put it on the shelf, and you guys can. On the bench. You guys can get all through it, you know, right now.
[01:02:16] Speaker C: Don't let you get on the shelf.
[01:02:17] Speaker E: Yeah, don't snap a branch off. I'm trying to move it through here. And. Yeah, and it was. It was incredible. It grew. It drew a crowd, like, right away. And, yeah, Ryan just walked up, like, nice. Kick some dudes out of the way and was like, how much? Yeah, he was in it like a spider monkey, man. He was all. He's all figuring all the branches. He's like. And it was a solid tree.
[01:02:38] Speaker C: It was.
[01:02:38] Speaker E: It was fantastic. It was. It was great.
[01:02:40] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:02:41] Speaker E: And I feel like if you see.
[01:02:42] Speaker C: A really good tree, you got to be quick and you got to snap it up.
[01:02:46] Speaker E: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So Friday, when I set up for the show, like, everyone's like, I want to buy it. And I was like, can't sell it to you till Friday. Me till Saturday, so come back Saturday. And when I got here, one guy was already in line. He's like, I'm buying this one and this one. I'm like, okay.
[01:03:01] Speaker C: Yeah, I can't.
[01:03:02] Speaker E: I'm not gonna wait. I'm not gonna wait around. So. And I. You know, I. One thing I. I like to give back to bonsai is trying to make it as fair as possible. Yeah. I want to make a. Money to help my business, but I also need you to have a tree. I want you to have a good piece of material without, you know, not being able to pay your mortgage or something. So I like to try and price things as fair as I can, you know?
[01:03:28] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[01:03:28] Speaker E: For everybody. You know, I've been told I'm. I'm. I'm. My prices are too low, but I. I feel like it's fair.
Yeah.
[01:03:37] Speaker C: Nice.
[01:03:37] Speaker E: Yeah, Nice.
The funny thing about that tree, I'll tell you, the one that Ryan picked out two years ago, I was hiking. I don't.
I go areas where most people don't, like, won't go because it's difficult. It's hard. And that day, there was nothing I couldn't find anything. I found trees to collect, but you can't collect certain trees. They're just either in a small crack or they're just impossible to collect off the granite. And I was feeling pretty defeated, and I was like, I'm just gonna turn around, go home. Like, this is a waste of time and I'm going through. And I climbed this hill, and it was kind of a cloudy day and the sun broke, and it was like a beam of light was, like, on this tree that was on top of a rock or boulder, I should say. And, like, the sun was beaming off, and I was like, holy.
I scampered up that mountain, man. Saw that thing. And I was like, oh, man, this is perfect. Perfect size.
[01:04:30] Speaker C: So that's awesome.
[01:04:31] Speaker E: Yeah, that's a funny little story about that tree.
[01:04:33] Speaker C: So very nice.
[01:04:36] Speaker E: Yeah.
[01:04:38] Speaker C: Cool. Well, you got some nice ones here. I really like this guy right here in this box.
[01:04:44] Speaker E: Yeah, that's your. I call that the rest in peace crowbar.
[01:04:48] Speaker C: Oh.
[01:04:49] Speaker E: Because when I was on my back, I had two of those on my back, and my crowbar fell and it rolled down a little bit. It's probably about six feet away. But it was. Was down the hill and I was like, if I bend down to pick that thing up, I'll never get back up. So I'm like, see you later, crowbar. So my crowbar was sacrificed to the mountain, and it's. It's part of the mountain now.
[01:05:09] Speaker C: Gotcha.
[01:05:09] Speaker E: So rest. Rest in peace, crowbar. And yeah, that tree was actually. It was on its back, so all the foliage is pointing straight forward, but it was on his back, so actually that foliage was pointing straight up towards the sun.
[01:05:24] Speaker C: Nice. I like the way you oriented it.
[01:05:26] Speaker E: Yeah. So I want to. It needs to sit up a little bit. Once it gets repotted, it's going to rotate forward. What I see is it should rotate forward to show more of the deadwood and then slightly the left side slightly up, so bringing the top more to the right, and then you can bend it back towards the left and then compact it, and it's going to look totally nice.
[01:05:47] Speaker C: Nice.
[01:05:48] Speaker E: Totally dope.
[01:05:49] Speaker C: Hey, tell me. Tell me a little bit about the copper wire that you sell.
[01:05:55] Speaker E: Yeah. So Jim Grimmel was the only guy in the copper wire. And you know Jim. A lot of people know Jim. And I would ask him questions. Every year I'd see him, I'd ask him like. And he'd like, oh. You know, whenever. Whenever anyone asks me about copper wire, I seem to forget. So I'd Bug the shit out of him. I bugged him and I bugged him and I bugged him. And he finally told me, like, one little tip. I was like, okay, good. Because he was getting older and I was like, you know, I'm younger. I'm going to be in Bonsai forever.
I see there's an opportunity here, and if he gives me a little bit of advice, I'm going to run with it. So I worked and worked and worked and worked and built a kiln on.
[01:06:36] Speaker C: Did you build a kiln specifically to.
[01:06:38] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:06:39] Speaker E: Yeah.
[01:06:39] Speaker C: Okay.
[01:06:40] Speaker E: Yeah, it is just for that. Um, and my first couple samples came out and I tested it with some of the older folks and the Bib Club and they were saying it's too hard. Like, it's, it's a young man's strength to bend it. So I was like, okay. I went back and figured out, like, all right, what I gotta do to make this softer. And, you know, so I made it softer and I brought it back to the same old folks and they were like, oh, yeah, yeah, good, good. Super soft. And that's. It's old man strong now. I can bend it. And, and then, you know, you know, there's little changes here and there to make it softer and softer and, and, and it turned out. It turns out great. So it's, it's the timing, the, the, the, the temperature. Everything is dialed in, man. It's, it's great. It's come a long way.
[01:07:23] Speaker C: Fantastic.
[01:07:24] Speaker E: The only complaint I've ever had was it has too many particles on it. So after it's cooled off and it's, it's set, I wash it.
[01:07:32] Speaker C: Ah, okay.
[01:07:32] Speaker E: I power wash it.
[01:07:33] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, yeah.
[01:07:35] Speaker E: Get all the oxidized dust off that I can, you know.
[01:07:39] Speaker C: Yeah, I, I don't like the, the dust. Oxidized particles on it. When you move it, it breaks off and then it goes into the air and you're breathing it, which is probably not good for you.
[01:07:51] Speaker E: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's not shards. It's not shards of copper.
It is just oxidized metal. Yeah, it's just a burn from the. Where the flame touches the metal.
But yeah, after the washing process, it's really cleaned up and I can't get rid of it 100%. Yeah, the Japanese, their wire does not have that because I think it's electrical. These electric kilns, they don't use wood or propane or coal or anything like that.
[01:08:25] Speaker C: Yeah.
So was it always a spot smooth process to make?
[01:08:31] Speaker E: I know you're going with this. No, it wasn't.
No, no. When I was first learning, I blew my face off.
I had a. I had a brain fart. And I shut the. The vent off the top, the exhaust fan, so there's no oxygen. It was all gas. And I was looking at thermostat, and it was dropping rapidly, and I was like, oh, I know what happened. There's no more flame.
So the gas. The gas is the gas. The gas is colder.
And so I opened up the. You know, I shut everything off and open it up. But my kiln has an area where it can build a pocket.
And it was a pocket of gas, and I wasn't wearing any facial protection, and I was on my knees, like, so directly in front of the door, and I had the door opened up. And when I thought it was enough time has passed for it to exhaust out, I ended up lighting it, and I heard it suck air. So as a back flash that was about to happen, and I was right in the middle of it, and all I could do was. I started to move my head down, but I closed my eyes. I don't burn my eyes. And I got basically washed with fire. So I singed all my hair, third degree. My nose, my neck, eyebrows were gone, eyelashes.
[01:09:47] Speaker C: Did you go to the hospital, right?
[01:09:49] Speaker E: Yeah. Yeah, I had to go to the hospital, and I had to go to the burn unit. And, yeah, it was. It was gnarly. I had to go up to UC Davis.
[01:09:57] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:09:58] Speaker E: So. And my. Yeah, it was bad. It was. I was very fortunate. It could have been a lot more worse. I look at it that way. It was total learning experience. Now, I. If I light my kiln, I. I'm not in front of it, or I have some facial protection on.
Don't try it at home, kids.
[01:10:18] Speaker C: Just for all the ladies out there, I just want to let you know that Matt is still looking good.
Are you single?
[01:10:27] Speaker E: I'm now single. Yeah.
[01:10:28] Speaker C: Gotcha, Gotcha. All right, so for the ladies. He's still looking good. There's no.
[01:10:31] Speaker E: Yeah, I got a. I got a. I got a nice. I got a facial, like, abrasions and whatnot. What's that scrub the ladies get? You know that facial scrub? I got that, but with fire instead of friction.
[01:10:42] Speaker C: I'm glad you're okay.
[01:10:44] Speaker E: Yeah, thanks, man.
[01:10:45] Speaker C: It wasn't more serious, but that. That was pretty serious. But at least there's no.
[01:10:49] Speaker E: Yeah, it's very scary. It was very scary. You know, I'm very, like. I was very fortunate. I didn't burn, like, a lot I didn't melt. And I was in a burn unit. I had to go back. And when I walked into this unit, there's people with serious burns. I work in medicine. My normal 9 to 5 is medicine, and I've worked on burning before, and it's, It's. It's to be quite devastating.
[01:11:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:11:08] Speaker E: So I'm very fortunate. So I'm happy about that. My hair grew back, my skin grew back. You know, I look 10 years younger.
[01:11:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:11:17] Speaker E: So, yeah.
[01:11:19] Speaker C: Awesome.
[01:11:20] Speaker E: Besides that, that's the only accident I've ever had, knock on wood. I've fallen off some rocks collecting trees. That happens, you know.
[01:11:28] Speaker C: No serious injuries. No collecting, though.
[01:11:31] Speaker E: Came across some rattlesnakes. Fell in a. Fell in a scrub bush, and with a rattlesnake inside of it, I think the Lord reached out and pulled me out of it. I came out that bush so fast. It was with a tree on my back. It was incredible. So.
[01:11:43] Speaker C: Geez.
[01:11:44] Speaker E: Yeah. Yeah, it's good.
[01:11:45] Speaker C: Ah, well. Hey, man, I remember some really fun times with you four wheeling out on some.
[01:11:51] Speaker E: Oh, yeah.
[01:11:52] Speaker C: Some abandoned roads.
[01:11:54] Speaker E: Yeah.
[01:11:54] Speaker C: Up in the Sierra and collecting and camping out there. Just some really incredible times.
[01:12:00] Speaker E: Yeah, it's fun.
[01:12:01] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:12:01] Speaker E: She do it again.
[01:12:02] Speaker C: I'd be. I'd be down. It's hard with the little ones.
[01:12:04] Speaker E: I know it is real hard, but.
[01:12:05] Speaker C: I would love to.
[01:12:06] Speaker E: It's real hard.
[01:12:07] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:12:08] Speaker E: So if everyone's gonna go out there and collect, you know, make sure you do it right. Collect the right stuff. Clean up your mess.
[01:12:13] Speaker C: Don't, don't 100.
[01:12:15] Speaker E: Don't leave square roots hanging out. If you trample the ground.
[01:12:19] Speaker C: Leave no trace.
[01:12:19] Speaker E: Yeah, leave no trace. Just make it look right. Get permission, you know, just. Just respect. Respect the mountains because, you know, we are taking trees from a mountain space and using them for bonsai. And, you know, a lot of people are against that. They think it's. It's bad. And. Yeah, I can understand that. But we're not taking thousands of trees and we're not taking trees that are 8ft tall, you know, or these are small trees that. And I collect all the granite and most of them are kind of struggling survive. So I feel like I give a really good chance to survive when I. When I collect these trees.
[01:12:56] Speaker C: It's crazy. The fire point that you made earlier, that's significant.
[01:13:00] Speaker E: I mean, oh, man, it's so bad. You just hold on. I think it's like 100. I think it know it's a million acres that went up and it just devastated this area. And It's. It's like walking on. It's like driving through the moon. It's. It's so bizarre. Like giant furs that have been there for hundreds of years are just. They're gone. They're gone. It's a hillside now. It's sad. So.
Yeah. So hopefully, you know, by collecting some trees, we get to keep them in case another fire happens. So.
[01:13:30] Speaker C: Yeah. So cool, man.
[01:13:33] Speaker E: Yeah. Besides that, I grow. I got a couple grows going.
I do a lot of root over rock projects. I've got some black pine rudder rock. Trying a maple, some Japanese maple, chocolate, Chinese quince. Yeah. I think the Chinese quint river rock. I've only seen one and I thought it was amazing, so I was like, I want to do that. So those are, those are interesting trees to do.
They don't quite behave the way I want them to behave on a rock, but it's. It's still a process, so. So hopefully in a couple years you guys will see one.
[01:14:10] Speaker C: Nice, man. Yeah.
Where can people find out more about you?
[01:14:15] Speaker E: I'm on social media. I have a website, but mostly if you want to get in touch with me, it's Matthew bonsai.com or I'm on Instagram @bonchibonsai and Facebook is Matthew Walker. But I don't really post too much on Facebook so, you know, people don't. A lot of the people I know off of Facebook don't really aren't into bonsai. I don't know about bonsai. They make kind of weird comments. So. But yeah, so. But yeah, mostly Instagram. Bunchy Bonsai.
[01:14:43] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:14:44] Speaker E: Yeah.
[01:14:45] Speaker C: Any. Any thoughts about the show? Like anything that you.
[01:14:50] Speaker E: The show. Yeah, this show is. It's really good. It's good. It's done really well.
I like the amount of trees. They could probably put. They could probably put more trees in here for show trees that. There's a lot of space. If they come back to this place, I would only suggestion I would have for them is get better lighting because it's really dark in here.
[01:15:12] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:15:13] Speaker E: And the vendor section is huge. There's a lot of space. The first PBE was very cramped and crowded. Everyone was shoulder to shoulder. It was. It was like almost madhouse. But here's a lot of space. There's a lot of excellent vendors and you know, I think it's enjoyable if they can. If they do it again, then if this is going to be the spot, I would just say get some better lighting. That's it.
[01:15:37] Speaker C: Yeah, I know they hate for extra lighting, so. Yeah.
[01:15:40] Speaker E: It's just those little tiny square ones as little ones. But I could. I could see. I could see. I don't know, maybe some hanging light somewhere.
[01:15:47] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:15:48] Speaker E: I don't know. I'm gonna go to the thrift store, get some lamps.
[01:15:51] Speaker C: You know, one thing I would love to hear is when they announce the winners of the show, I want to hear speeches from the winners.
[01:16:02] Speaker E: Oh, that'd be kind of cool. Yeah.
[01:16:03] Speaker C: Yeah, I think. I think it'd just be cool to, like, you know, say thank you to the people that have helped you and. And just hear stuff, really.
[01:16:10] Speaker E: I don't think it should be called the PBE Show. I think it should be called the Jeff Stern Wins all the Awards at the Pacific Bonsai Expo show.
He's got some great trees.
[01:16:19] Speaker C: Sure. So awesome, man.
[01:16:22] Speaker E: Yep. And hopefully in two years, my. This year, I didn't present a tree. I had a fungus at the.
I got a fungus at the start of summer, and it killed half of my tree. So that tree came out. So hopefully in two years, I'll have two entries, so.
[01:16:38] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, yeah. Nice.
[01:16:39] Speaker E: Yeah.
[01:16:40] Speaker C: Very cool.
[01:16:40] Speaker E: Yeah. Well, listen, it's getting late.
[01:16:42] Speaker C: Yeah. I appreciate a lot. Really appreciate you. It's always great hanging out with you, man.
[01:16:47] Speaker E: Yeah, man. Always good to see you, man.
[01:16:49] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:16:49] Speaker E: All right, homeboy. High five.
Nice.
[01:16:54] Speaker C: Thanks, dude.
[01:16:54] Speaker E: All right, bud.
[01:16:59] Speaker B: Thanks.
[01:16:59] Speaker G: Cheer by. You know, it's been really fun meeting you. This has been a really great show.
[01:17:04] Speaker C: It's funny, I recognize your voice from the. One of the Mariah podcasts.
[01:17:08] Speaker G: Okay.
[01:17:09] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:17:09] Speaker G: Yeah.
[01:17:10] Speaker C: So I'm like, I. I feel like I have met you before, but I've just seen pictures, followed you on Instagram, and heard you on the Bride podcast, so that's.
[01:17:18] Speaker G: That's really cool.
[01:17:19] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:17:20] Speaker G: You know, Ryan, you know, mentioning Mirai podcast, and Ryan, you know, I'm a student of Ryan's.
Ryan, Todd and I both, we all started out apprenticing under a man named Harold Sasaki.
[01:17:36] Speaker C: Yeah. Okay, you did.
[01:17:38] Speaker G: And I didn't know Ryan, but I knew of him, and I knew that he was helping Harold, but him and I never really crossed paths until he came back from Japan. And then Todd was studying with Ryan for Ryan's first year of operation at Bonsai Mirai. And then they both kind of told me, will come out and study with us for, you know, for the second year. So I was in Ryan's second class. Second year of class.
[01:18:07] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:18:07] Speaker G: And I've been studying there ever since.
[01:18:09] Speaker C: Okay.
[01:18:10] Speaker G: This tree that I'm displaying here at the Pacific Bonsai Expo is my, my senior thesis for Bonsai Mirai, if you will. So as a four year student, this was my, this was my senior project there. I think I bought it in from Randy in about 2016.
And we.
The part of the tree that you're looking at as the front used to be the top of the tree in nature. So this was a very low growing tree spread out across the rocks.
And Ryan teaches us that to maximize, you want to maximize the drama of a tree. And in this case the maximal drama of this tree is by tilting it vertically and being able to see the entire gin structure. It's a, it's a gin network, if you will. It's like, it's almost like looking at a city grid of streets or something. It's very, it's a, it's, it's, it's a wild tree. It's got playful deadwood.
[01:19:16] Speaker C: Awesome. And I am, I should have started out like this. I'm so sorry, I don't know if we, if we, if you said your name.
[01:19:24] Speaker G: I'm Will Kearns.
[01:19:25] Speaker C: Will Kearns. And what's your Instagram handle?
[01:19:28] Speaker G: Wil Kearns Banzai. That's W, I, L L, K E R N S. Banzai. All one word and there's no A in Kerns. It's just K E R N S.
So yes.
[01:19:40] Speaker C: This is an absolutely badass Rocky Mountain. Thank you. I'm so impressed. And one game that I like to play is I like to walk around and look at Yamadori and try and guess the orientation.
[01:19:53] Speaker G: Oh, so sorry.
Like guess, try and guess the orientation of how it was growing in nature.
[01:19:59] Speaker C: Exactly. Yes. But now see I, I had guessed with Todd's tree.
[01:20:06] Speaker G: Okay.
[01:20:06] Speaker C: Because usually the deadwood is, is the part that is facing the elements and most exposed and then the live vein is more protected.
So like with Todd's pondo, which is also a badass tree. Yeah. I could kind of guess the orientation that it was laid back and the deadwood was facing the harsher elements. Now that you point this one out, it makes total sense that it was laying like that. I don't know if I would have other than I guess that this is the left viewers left hand side. Gin is just hanging so low that it would have had to been like over a cliff or something. I guess. Yeah. Now that you pointed out, it's easy to understand but I don't know if I would have guessed it to be really straightforward with. Yeah, yeah. It's just such a dramatic tree and I love the interplay of the Live vein and the deadwood.
This lower gin is just the coolest thing ever.
[01:21:10] Speaker G: It's so old. Like this tree is probably, I don't know, it's between 500 and 1000 years old I would say just judging by how much deadwood there is, where it was growing, which Randy collected it out of Wyoming and that's not an easy place for a tree to grow.
It takes a very long time for a tree to get this large in Wyoming.
Yeah, it's. This tree has been a fun tree that like it's been a whole process. It's been a whole sort of dance with this tree in terms of Randy collecting it. And then I found it in Randy's grow yard. It was right after I sold my first house. So I had some money, I was a little bit of money that I was. Was going to put into my as a down payment for my house that I'm currently in. Well I just took a couple of, couple of thousand out of that down payment. That and I was like I need a senior project for button signing Rye and I went to Randy's grow yard with the idea of I need to try to find the best tree and the most amazing tree possible for this senior project as a four year student. And, and he had this one with all the dead wood. It was, you know, he had it. What we were looking at is the top of the tree in the grow box. You know, he had it in the grow box planted similar to what it was growing as in the wild.
[01:22:46] Speaker C: That's so cool.
[01:22:47] Speaker G: So yeah, managed to manage to get a great tree from Randy and then we built a cradle for it. So we built a, we started tipping the grow box up right away into more of a, more of the final position to just get the roots used to low roots getting all the water and high roots sort of drying out and eventually going to be cut off.
[01:23:12] Speaker C: That's fantastic. Yeah. Looks like a big pain in the butt to transport.
[01:23:18] Speaker G: It has a moving cradle so it is a pain in the butt to transport. It is spicy. You know, it's very, it's a very delicate tree and the moving cradle helps a lot. So to have to have a moving cradle that, that you can set the tree into the cradle and then it has handles and we can two men pick it up, put it on a wheeled cart and drive it around. You know I can strap it into the van and it, it makes it a lot easier. However, we did break a giant chunk of this tree off getting it out here. So like in the month ahead of this. Of this show. I've been prepping this tree, and I've been having nightmares about, like, how's the move going to go? Am I going to break the tree? Like, is this tree going to survive this journey?
And sure enough, we broke a significant chunk of the tail off the tree, putting it into the moving cradle. But it worked out perfectly because where the tail broke is just a perfect place where now we can detach it and we can still wire the tail on which it's held on by wire.
[01:24:30] Speaker B: And it's.
[01:24:31] Speaker G: It's slotted in exactly where. Where it was growing. So you're not missing anything. It hasn't changed at all. But basically, breaking, accidentally breaking the gin actually helped us be able to move it a little bit more easily and a little bit less stressfully because now I can wrap that piece of tail in the. In a towel and set it. Set it aside, and it's not just dangling precariously in the back of a van that's bumping around, bumping down the road.
[01:25:03] Speaker C: For sure. For sure.
[01:25:04] Speaker G: So it worked out well. It was.
It was the best situation possible.
[01:25:10] Speaker C: Nice.
[01:25:10] Speaker G: So a nightmare turned into actually.
[01:25:15] Speaker C: A.
[01:25:15] Speaker G: Blessing in a way.
[01:25:17] Speaker C: Fantastic. Would you tell me about the pot? That pot looks familiar to me.
[01:25:22] Speaker G: Yeah. So that's the Ron Lang lab pot. It's. It's.
It's a.
It was part of Ron's lab project with Ryan and Austin. The Pacific Bonsai Museum commissioned Ron to make this very architecturally sort of significant pot that is inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright.
The. When Ron made this pot, he made two of them because if something happened to one of the pots, Ron wanted to have us a backup pot in case nothing happened to either pot. They're both in existence. The initial lab pot is at the Pacific Bonsai Museum with, you know, housing the lab tree.
And I was able to procure this pot from Ryan. He had it. He had it for sale, and I was able to snag it. This pot very.
I think I love this pot for this tree because it physically holds up the tree's structure of the dead wood that's cascading down. And, you know, I'm a big fan of Frank Lloyd Wright and I'm a big fan of Ron Lang.
[01:26:37] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[01:26:38] Speaker G: So Ron Lang and Frank Lloyd Wright have inspired me in the past and in a way that this is, you know, Ron Lang isn't making pots anymore, so it's really fun to have him here at the show, you know, have his work here at the show. And like, the Frank Lloyd Wright Inspiration. Frank Lloyd has been an inspiration of mine for a very long time. I've been a. You know, I love Frank Lloyd Wright architecture. So having a pot inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright through the eyes of Ron Lang is a big honor. It's an honor.
[01:27:15] Speaker C: It's really historic piece. Thanks. And I'm glad you got it.
[01:27:20] Speaker G: And I just think it works perfectly with this tree. It's like the contrast between.
Between having a tree that has nothing flat. Everything is a curve, everything is wiggly, everything is organic to having these flat planes on the pot. It's.
[01:27:37] Speaker B: It's.
[01:27:37] Speaker G: It works. It's like a. It's like art. It's like framing a piece of art in that the pot is kind of like a frame.
[01:27:45] Speaker C: Very nice.
What's the deal with the stone? Very unique.
[01:27:50] Speaker G: Oh, yeah.
[01:27:51] Speaker C: Okay. I don't know anything about it.
[01:27:52] Speaker G: Let's quick take a.
So this stone was a gift from my teacher, Jerry Morris. Jerry Morris is sort of a legend in terms of. He was a dwarf. He was an expert on dwarf conifers. So, like dwarf conifers, being certain conifers in the mountains, develop a mutation called a witch's broom. And Jerry used to go collect the foliage from witches brooms, and he used to graft them, and he used to grow dwarf conifers.
And Jerry's interest in dwarf conifers led Jerry to bonsai. And bonsai is how Jerry started. Started doing. He started doing bonsai, and he got very into bonsai. And in fact, Jerry Morris at one point was working for a publishing magnet who was paying Jerry to collect huge trees out in nature and literally put them on the back of semi trucks and take them to a place in the mountains near Aspen. And Jerry set a.
Basically built a mountainside, built, installed trees at a very, very installed. Installed trees on a mega scale into this mountainside. And these were like huge alpine trees, giant bristlecone pines, giant limber pines, giant Rocky Mountain junipers. Jerry Morris is just a legend. He's. He's helped us in the club. He was a mentor to both me and Todd for a long time. I think he's also been a mentor to Ryan Neal as well. And this stone was a gift from Jerry to me. It's a desert viewstone. This stone, when I look at it, takes me to Moab, Utah. It looks. It looks like Moab. Like, you can see the slick rock. You can see this stone is made out of, like, an iron ore That's. That is. Maybe it's like some kind of iron ore that has sand in it.
It was collected out of Utah and it even has like a mountain pass where you can see kind of a trail that leads through a mountain pass.
So. Yeah, that's the. So, you know, and Jerry's no longer with us. He passed away a few years ago. So I'm also just so happy to have a piece of Jerry, you know, in the composition. I miss them.
[01:30:21] Speaker C: Ah, that's incredible. Beautiful stone.
[01:30:24] Speaker G: Thanks. Thanks. Yeah, yeah. This, I mean, this has been a big deal. This is my first ever national show.
[01:30:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:30:32] Speaker G: And this tree is probably my best tree in my collection. And I just. The foliage is. I'm a little bit self conscious about the foliage. The foliage isn't perfect. It's the native foliage on the, on the. It's native Rocky Mountain juniper foliage. Parts of it are a little bit sick. And I. And so bringing this tree home, I'm going to be putting it. I'm working with Todd. We're developing a fertilization program for it going into winter.
[01:31:03] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:31:04] Speaker G: So it's pretty, it's pretty fun. Like the tree is, is still happy. It's just doing some, some things that a Rocky Mountain juniper does normally, which is sometimes abandoning low, low hanging, lower level branches that are in the shade.
But I think we still have time to save some of those. And you know, we're going to be getting this tree nice and happy going into the winter and then who knows what the future holds for this tree. But it's a fun one and I just feel so honored to be showing it here at the show. And this accomplishes sort of a lifelong goal for me, which is to show a tree at a national level show.
[01:31:47] Speaker C: Oh, yeah. Well, you knocked it out of the park. Great work, Jeremiah.
[01:31:52] Speaker E: It means a lot.
[01:31:53] Speaker G: I appreciate it. Thanks for the compliment, for sure.
[01:31:56] Speaker C: Hey, thank you so much for your time. It was fantastic to meet you in person. Yeah.
[01:31:59] Speaker G: Great to meet you.
[01:32:00] Speaker C: Awesome, man. Fun. Thank you.
[01:32:01] Speaker G: Very fun.
[01:32:05] Speaker C: First off, would you give me just a super brief introduction on yourself? Yeah.
[01:32:10] Speaker F: My name is Jose Maria Garcia Gonzalez. I'm from Chicago. I've been in banzai for around 7 years.
[01:32:18] Speaker G: Awesome.
[01:32:18] Speaker F: Truly under a teacher about 5.
[01:32:21] Speaker B: 5.
[01:32:21] Speaker F: My main teacher right now is Boone. So I've been working with him for a long time and that's what brought me here.
[01:32:28] Speaker E: I.
[01:32:28] Speaker F: We have a pomegranate field grown that's been in training for around 10 years and I'm the third owner.
So this is the second time we show it. And it's a, it's a massive tree. It's Very interesting tree to look at, but it's still very young in its bonsai journey. Ramification is not perfect. We do know that we have to outgrow a little bit more of the branches, make it a little thicker. But that's part of this hobby. It's the journey, like. And it's nice to show your tree early and then maybe show it 10 years later and see everything that's changed. Showing is fun. It's hard, like, you know, like, you know, carrying your tree here, setting it up, it's very tiring. But it is a very rewarding, especially when you're creating a tree because you get. Instead of getting like your teacher's opinion, your friends, you get 100 people's opinions. And you might think of. You might hear things that you never thought of, which is very interesting. But it's been a fantastic event. I think we had. They had probably one of the best showing of trees I've seen in a long time. Any show.
I missed the first one and I don't know, were you here the first one? I think.
[01:33:40] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:33:40] Speaker F: So what, what do you think is it had improved from this one to the first?
[01:33:45] Speaker C: Well, I think both of the events were absolutely incredible and magical.
I think the. The venue of the last one was. Was such a cool location. There was just the lighting was. Was really cool. It's very industrial. It was a very awesome building. But this building is equally cool and it's way bigger. So I really like that aspect of it.
[01:34:12] Speaker F: Yeah, it has an appeal. I think the first one, it lended itself, at least by the pictures I saw, lend itself more to the art that was placed in the room.
I feel like the art install is just beautiful. And if you guys haven't seen the pictures, you should. The structure they build is fantastic.
It's almost like a flowing structure almost with like an example Japanese joint. Joint. Jointery. I think that's the right word, but it's fantastic. But I do think that in the other, really, based on the photos I saw, it blended better. Like you said, it's more industrial. But again, it's been a fantastic event. Like today, we're, again, we're the second day of the event. We've had fantastic teachings, fast acting, lectures, demos were great, vendors were fantastic. I really don't see anything negative. And you know, if you guys have never really experienced an event like this, you should definitely, you know, consider doing it in the next year or two. Again, this event comes every other year because we, we divide the year between Rochester and here. Just to have one show on either side of the coast.
[01:35:28] Speaker C: So.
[01:35:28] Speaker F: But both shows are fantastic.
But yeah, like, I really have. No, no, no other, like, comments. Oh, the one thing that we did do this year, which is very interesting because normally we do have a lot of Japanese professionals that come, like Daisaku is one of the more well known. But this year we actually had the privilege to have the potters of Tokonomi here with us and it was fantastic. And we really got to see their work, their pots. And it's fantastic how they have become very good friends with now. And now is a potter out of Oregon, Portland, Oregon. And he does fantastic work. So I highly recommend. If you guys don't know his work, see it because I. Well, a good example, if you see Jeremiah's tree, that's one of his pots and it's a fantastic accent to his tree. I really love the shape.
Now, one thing I want you all to. If you're listening to his podcast, Jeremiah does have a little secret in his basically, like, presentation.
I don't know if you showed the picture already, but if you only see the big one, try a look. It's a little thing and it's fantastic. I'm not going to spoil for anyone. You guys can look at the big picture and see where you can find it. It's a little figurine hiding somewhere. So see if you can see it.
So, but again, just a little bit about myself going back to that. Again, I primarily live in Chicago. Everyone knows, like, Chicago winters are very brutal. Most people are very afraid of winterizing trees. And I think back in Chicago we do a really good job. It's a little harder because you do have to have, you know, a heater system and. But it is doable. Like my wife and me already have a system. We actually set up a greenhouse every year.
[01:37:21] Speaker C: Nice.
[01:37:22] Speaker F: It's greenhouse day. We actually call it hoop house. And then we keep heated and it's. It's doable. It's doable.
[01:37:29] Speaker C: Do you keep the trees right around freezing?
[01:37:31] Speaker F: A 35 or above.
[01:37:33] Speaker C: Okay.
[01:37:34] Speaker F: Just because I always aim for plus minus five.
[01:37:37] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:37:38] Speaker F: And anything I do. Because you never know about the swing and you always, you know, run into the problem that some like maybe the. I use primarily propane heaters over forced air heaters just because I feel the force. Heater dries out the poop house too much.
[01:37:55] Speaker C: That's great. That's great.
Um, sorry, we're recording a podcast, but no, no problem at all. That can probably help you out. He's. He's the man.
[01:38:07] Speaker F: Yeah, he's the man.
[01:38:11] Speaker C: But what's up, Alexi? How you doing, man?
Awesome, awesome, awesome.
[01:38:18] Speaker F: Doing well.
[01:38:19] Speaker C: Really good, really good. Really good. How often are you visiting Boone?
[01:38:23] Speaker F: I normally in my single days, I would come here about four times a year.
[01:38:29] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:38:30] Speaker F: Oh, sometimes up to five now that I have a child and the family and married.
I still come about three times a year.
[01:38:38] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:38:39] Speaker F: But I make those trips a little bit longer. So just to make it worthwhile.
[01:38:44] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:38:44] Speaker F: So maybe three to four days, depending on what the time of the season it is. But I do have the. I'm fortunate I can have Boone come to me and that's always good to have a teacher come to your house. Now, that being said, if you are starting this hobby, because again, I'm relatively new. Jeremiah's been a lot longer and I met Jeremiah through my adventures here in basically California. But if you are new to this, like, my biggest recommendation is podcasts are great, class online are great. But the biggest pitfall when you start is material. A lot of times we. And we all started that way. We buy a hundred, like, okay. Material that may never go anywhere. So sometimes it's better to have a guided first purchase experience and choosing one or two good trees.
I think that's always the best thing. So really, like, I really highly recommend, like, Jeremiah works for Peter T. Fantastic teacher. Boone's fantastic teacher. I really. And that's one thing that we have here in, in the States. We have a lot of really good teachers. Like, it was sad that Bjorn had to go back to Japan, but. And we will miss him. But again, another really good teacher. I'm sure Jeremiah's had him on before. Kaya Mooney. He's going around the States now, so I really recommend that you guys check him out. He is very friendly, always up for questions. And, you know, a lot of times he has really good, affordable pots also, if you're starting with that. But yeah, we've known during my. I mean, we've known T for a long time and he's good. He's been doing some good work.
But yeah, but again, those are little tidbits with everything.
[01:40:34] Speaker B: Awesome.
[01:40:35] Speaker C: Hey, on your pomegranate, do you know the. Any guess on the age or the history?
[01:40:42] Speaker F: I know it was field grown and dug out of the field.
[01:40:45] Speaker C: And by field grown, you mean grown probably for production.
[01:40:49] Speaker F: For production.
[01:40:52] Speaker C: In the Central Valley?
[01:40:54] Speaker F: I believe so.
[01:40:55] Speaker C: Okay. I believe so. There's a whole lot that were grown in the Central Valley, so that would make sense.
[01:41:01] Speaker F: And then again, it was Dug up first and then kept by two owners before. I would guess it's anywhere about 50. 50 to 60 years.
[01:41:08] Speaker C: Sweet.
[01:41:09] Speaker F: I don't think it's that old.
[01:41:11] Speaker C: Okay. Yeah.
Who are the owners previous to you?
[01:41:14] Speaker F: That I don't know.
[01:41:15] Speaker C: Okay.
[01:41:16] Speaker F: I am not aware of those.
[01:41:17] Speaker C: Got it.
[01:41:19] Speaker F: Like, we might. If I might actually get you the information later, we can put in the comment section. Yeah, I can get all that for everyone when you look at the pictures. And they'll have. We'll give a history. A good history. So you guys can see in the comment section when Jeremiah puts it up. Awesome. But how about your tree? You've talked about your tree a lot, too.
Like, Jeremiah's more like this is your average of you.
[01:41:42] Speaker C: You.
[01:41:42] Speaker F: Not the reverse.
[01:41:43] Speaker C: But.
[01:41:43] Speaker F: No, but really, that your tree has come a long way. I love when you put.
[01:41:48] Speaker C: It's.
[01:41:48] Speaker F: Actually, I'm. I'm a little starstruck because I've seen this tree.
What? Starstruck. Oh, is that. Is that. I have starstruck when I saw your tree.
[01:42:00] Speaker C: Thanks, man.
[01:42:00] Speaker F: Yeah, because it's funny because it looks small, and when you see it in real life, it's huge. But it's a fantastic tree.
So. Any other questions? You want keep going?
[01:42:12] Speaker C: No, that's great, man. Really appreciate it. And your pomegranate is phenomenal.
[01:42:17] Speaker F: Thank you.
[01:42:17] Speaker C: It's such a.
It's got such a presence to it, and I am a big fan of it, and I think it's a beautiful, beautiful tree. So I'm really excited that you have it and that you showed it here.
[01:42:29] Speaker F: And I might. Yeah. And I'm hopeful I can show it again and again and hopefully it gets better and better and better.
[01:42:34] Speaker C: Absolutely. Cool, man. Appreciate it. Thanks.
