Post 175 Ficus air layering

Please have a look at the POSTSCRIPT at the bottom of this post, regarding the success of this technique.

 
In May I posted a story about some ficus I've been working on. They are mostly benjamina 'shortys' and the plan has been to turn them into heavy trunked shohin.

For this one, the root over rock, the grafted top has grown on really well considering the time of year the graft was set.
With spring now with us and things getting up some momentum it's time to air layer off the base. I want to take it off just at the level where the rock is visible to make use of the flaring in the trunk at that point.
Partly because if that position and partly to hedge my bets I'm going to do a drill and toothpick layer rather than take off a full strip of bark.

 Here I've marked the level I want to create new root growth.

 Here you can see I've gone around the tree and drilled closely spaced holes, in 

about 3 or 4 mm.

 Next comes the tooth  picks with root hormone on the end inserted in the holes. This shows the sort of nebari I'm aiming for.

 Then it's a matter of positioning the dam to hold the potting medium in place and filling it up.

Now comes the wait. Should be ready by Christmas I'm hoping.

POSTSCRIPT from February 2015.

I waited and waited and nothing happened as it should, so eventually just replaced the ring of toothpicks with the removal of a full ring of bark in the usual manner. This produced roots in about 6 weeks and I separated it soon after. I've tried this toothpick technique on other species and it didn't work well there either so would not suggest using it
 Have a look here to see how it was successfully layered.

Post 174 Glaze Trial number 9

I've been making a few pots lately and have a kiln load full and few more drying. While they are I've got onto another trial of glazes. Frankly I've been putting this off for some time and every time I think about it again I change my ideas a little on what to trial. Perhaps that's why it hasn't happened - just hadn't reached that point of commitment. Or mabee it's just that it's such a tedious task. Oh yes and the fact that keeper recipes are in the minority.

In my first posts on glaze testing back at Post 30 and Post 32 I provided the recipes for a number of the base glazes I use.
At Post 77 and Post 79 I covered some work on brown glazes. That was trial 7 and I see then that I missed posting anything on trial 8.

It all starts on the computer with recipes expressed in percentages which then have to be converted into actual weights to mix. I'm now doing individual glazes in 15 gram batches for trial so the percentages have to be converted to add up to 15 grams, without missing any components. Then you have to get down and do the weighing out.

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I have a number of base glazes which I use and within each a number of favoured glazes. The objective of this trial is to take those favoured glazes and make minor variations to the recipes to create a number of ranges in tone. So that has made the preparation a little easier. For example if I have 6 glazes to be made from the same base I then mix up 6 * 15 grams of the base and then divide the mixed base between 6 containers for the colourants to be added. That takes a little precision but can be done accurately with a well calibrated 50ml plastic syringe.
On top of that plan there were a few other individual recipes that I wanted to try, as well as a number of overlays combinations.

As you can see from the cup array above I use small disposable 200ml plastic cups to mix and track the trial glazes.

 After all the precision weighing, mixing and combining comes the painting. Because I paint the glaze onto my pots I don't dip or pour to glaze the test tiles, so I paint the test tiles. You begin to see why it is quite a task. This trial came to 53 tiles and I know I can fit 60 in my little kiln.
In this shot you can also see my formulation spreadsheet. The only way I can keep track of what I'm doing as I weigh out is to cross off the material at each recipe. You can see on the spreadsheet the number of individual weighings this trial has taken, by the number of crossed out components.

 And here they are loaded in my little kiln. I've tracked the actual firing performance I use in my big kiln - which is just a little different from the controller schedule because the hotter it gets it is less able to maintain the same rising temperature rate. So the little kiln is programmed to replicate the actual firing achieved in the big one - a very important step for a trial using a different kiln.
Fingers crossed - let's hope more than a few will be keepers.

A couple of days later now and I've edited back into the same post. Here is the first shot of the result, whcih produced some very useful variations. More detail to come.

Post 173 Bandicoots and cockies

Bandicoots are famous or is that infamous for fereting around in people's lawns in springtime looking for something good to eat. I'm not sure that's the right word for it actually because they can be very active aerators. People say we are soooooooo lucky to have bandicoots but I'm not sure I share the sentiment.

The one in this area is probably the Northern Brown Bandicoot, sooo cute says my wife!

They've been visiting my place lately and have taken a shine to a particular patch of grass.

 

  This was the result of one night's hunt. Each hole can be up to 60mm across and anything up to 100mm deep. They've got little pointed noses and the holes they dig look  like they're just right to get those noses down there.

 I can only guess that they are going after beetle larvae that would hatch out later in summer. The little 'coots are nocturnal and elusive and I haven't seen one yet. Apparently they have a body length of about 400mm and tail about 170mm; about the shape of a big rat and the size of a small fox terrier. As long as they aerate the lawn that's fine. If they find the vegee patch the friendship might not last.

The other visitors who are on a good behaviour bond at the moment are a few sulphur crested cockatoos - cockies as they are known almost universally. These ones have found our feeder and we can hear them from the house, cracking the grain. I let them stay just a short time before 'moving them on'; can't have them enjoying it so much they bring their friends. These are big birds ( up to 500mm long) and they can be quite destructive to man made things, including buildings. They generally move around in quite large flocks. These ones seemed quite tame and one even said 'hello cockie' to me so they are well habituated to people. My reply, in the nicest possible way, 'yes hello to you too, now on your way'.