[Sue Deacon]

Hi guys,

we are starting to build the new veg beds today. I need a wood preservative that works. The EU has put the kybosh (use that word - don't know how to spell it!) on creosote and I have little faith in the newer preservatives.

Has anyone any ideas for a preservative that 'does what it says on the tin' and wouldn't mean a second mortgage?

I used the 'new' creocote on the old beds after 3 years they are mush!

The photo is the view from the kitchen window - depressing isn't it?

[kindredspirit]

Second hand bricks? Spare concrete blocks? Spare concrete lintels?

When I was young, allotment holders used to put sheets of galvanized iron around their beds.

Just thinking of alternatives.

[Sue Deacon]

Too late, we already have the timber. We built something like this for a friend last year and it's working so well I wanted to do the same here.

She had a fabulous crop of just about everything from these 4 little squares!

[kindredspirit]

I put down a wooden fence years ago and I copied the Romans and torched the part of the posts that went into the ground and about six inches up from that. 30 years later I took up the posts and guess what? No rot!

Could you do that? The wood wouldn't look great being blackened but it should avoid rot.

Or.....paint 'em blue with swimming pool paint.

Or... put black plastic butyl liner on the insides.

Or.... paint the insides with Zinc Phosphate and treat the exterior with linseed oil.

[tagwex]

Linseed yes but pricey.
Here is a contentious one as the purists out there will come down on me from on high.... waste oil fro OH's "wheelie bin". I have used it several times and it does a great job. Cheap as chips too.

[tagwex]

Plenty of scrap galvanised iron sheeting on those adjacent sheds. Ha!

[Sue Deacon]

[Good guy]

Kindred Spirit's mention of old-time techniques got me thinking. In the past, pre-plastics, a wide variety of natural materials served the functions we now expect modern technologically derived materials to perform.

For instance, many things were made of wood and different woods were used for different purposes. The shafts of a cart were usually of ash, as were the spokes of the wheels because of their requiring tensile strength. The hubs were oak, I think, for hardness and axles may have been of holly, for toughness. Butchers' blocks and chopping boards are best made of beech, for its closeness of grain and anti-bacterial properties. Spindles were made from the spindle tree for its short, straight sections and printers' blocks were carved from tight-grained box.

Foresters, woodsmen and craftsmen working in wood had all this lore at their fingertips and one of the things they would have known is that alder is very useful in circumstances where the product is subject to wetness, as in ladles, buckets, milk/cream pans and in piling for structures in fresh water. However, I doubt whether Sue would be able to lay her hands on planks of alder for her raised bed. These days, it's sitka spruce or nothing, mores the pity!

[Good guy]

Tagwex, is that engine oil or chip pan oil? I think I'd rather have my spuds dressed with sunflower oil than flavoured with Eau de Sump!

[tagwex]

If you can remember an ass and cart one just has to wonder just how old are you? What exactly is a spindle tree? Eau de sump, I like that very good. Sure if it was lined wouldn't it lessen the impact you are dreading? I actually don't see it being that big of a problem and if it came to it the inner face need not be coated. Only problem with the waste oil though is how long it takes to dry.

[Sue Deacon]

The area where my new garden is was full of Alder trees! But I don't think they would have made good planks. One was already stricken with honey fungus and was on it's way out. The others were not that far behind. All gone now. The big fern in the photo I posted was growing out of the stump of one, I had to be careful with my wrecking bar when I levered out the remains of the stump. (and yes you CAN be careful with a wrecking bar!)

Tagwex - a Spindle tree is Euonymus europaeus. They used to be used for making, yes you guessed it, Spindles!

We have decided on a belt and braces approach to the veg beds. Creocote AND plastic for the inside. That should do it.

Tagwex - I can remember milk being delivered with an 'oss and cart. It was only the one mind. He was quite a celebrity, his horse knew the round better than him and would stop in the same places each day. That was in the days when milk had cream on the top - now that's going back a bit.

Good guy - engine oil v chip pan oil? I prefer my taters dripping with butter.

[tagwex]

A woman with a wrecking bar. AVOID!

[Sue Deacon]

He, He, He,

[Good guy]

When I was a child in England in the mid 50s, the local rag-and-bone man made his rounds with a horse and cart, á lá Steptoe and Son. And the farm beside us outside Enniskillen, in 1956, used a horse and cart to take their 3 cans of milk into the creamery at the Scotch Stores. Another nearby farm used a donkey and cart instead.

By the time I left for college in the late 60s, such working animals had all but vanished from the countryside in Northern Ireland though they were still in evidence in Donegal and Leitrim.

As for my age, Tagwex, it's hardly a state secret. Why don't you exercise your much-vaunted detection skills and surprise me with my date of birth? If you can give me the location, too, I'll send you a bulb of my garlic!

[tagwex]

Oooooh another challenge and all for one clove of garlic.
Oil drum lane for Steptoe and Son. I think the horse was Hercules.