Millie, if you live in cold country, try leaving it outside to freeze, then stick it in a sturdy paper grocery bag & whacking it with a hammer. This is not the voice of experience with CDs, but I accidentally ran over a plastic Rubbermaid stool when it was frozen (not much below 32F) & it shattered beautifully! 'Pup

That's a great idea for a bowling ball. That's what I'm going to do with mine right after it gets done' holding open the hole I dug but never planted anything in. LOL At least ya'll got snow...we were hoping for snow down here in Spring Branch. Not even a freeze this year for more than a couple hours. And, today at the end of April, record cold...whats up with that?

Found another ball on the way home. I ducked into a ts I don't often make it to and they had one! I was a good girl too. I grabbed the bowling ball and perused the beautiful but too pricey glassware and left. Gotta get home to feed the little people. Kids expect regular meals. So just need one more ball... Jane I'll post pics as soon as it's complete. Don't give up on me a move a tad bit slower than you do. You were a speed demon on that wonderful castle.

Clearly the tight balls on the Lake County web site are the result of close shearing and not how the plant grows on its own. Those I have seen here were fluffy pyramidal juvenile foliage forms; I am not surprised to hear about this falling over or splaying open, in the manner of similar forms of other species. That's too bad as it is rather appealing looking otherwise - in garden center sizes anyway. It isn't a matter of 'Bobazam' being a "correct" name and Mr. Bowling Ball then being therefore incorrect. The two names are instead two different things, Mr. Bowling Ball being a registered trademark used to sell the 'Bobazam' cultivar. During these days of large production nurseries in particular using trademarks and patents to assure profits being made on their plant introductions this combination of a memorable selling name (as these are called in Britain) and a jawbreaker cultivar name is common. Often the cultivar names in these instances are combinations of syllables that actually convey information, in this case the cultivar name surely stands for 'Bowling ball zam'pini - the last being the name of the principal of Lake County nursery. Here is a link that might be useful: [Mr. Bowling Ball] = 'Bobazam' Fact Sheet from Lake County nursery This post was edited by bboy on Fri, Aug 1, 14 at 22:34