I just ordered up some akadama and a full set and a half of annealed copper wire from Jim Gremel. I have used his wire for several years and can testify that it's absolutely fantastic. I ordered over $230 worth of wire in order to get free shipping. Not a dollar-for-dollar trade, but heck, I need the wire.

The weather has been in the seventies here, even a couple days of 80 degrees. Things are starting to move, but we could still have a hard freeze or two in store for the next month. It's such a temptation to start repotting, but without proper safe storage, it's not worth the risk. Don't think that just because your buds have barely begun to swell, that you must now repot. This is just the earliest you might want to. I have time.

Following are a couple of photos of my Korean hornbeam from 2005. At the time I thought I had purchased it in 1997, but in reality I believe it was 1999. What did I know back then? Not too much. I have continued to work with this tree, and will be posting current photos very soon. The ramification is coming along, but the longest root has died. This is not uncommon on hornbeams, and it doesn't concern me too much in that I plan to air layer this tree as soon as the leaves harden off. Current photos forthcoming.