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Rusty Hinge 2 · 17-05-2008, 07:39 AM posted to uk.rec.gardening

The message
from (Nick Maclaren) contains these words:

| You are quite right not to use the outfall from the washing-machine as
| many washing powders contain borax, which is an effective weedkiller.

Er, ineffective weedkiller, shirley?

Plants need boron in small quantities - if there is enough in your
washing-machine water to make the soil toxic to them, you have other
problems!

Your statement stands, of course - most washing-machine powders are
pretty nasty mixtures of chemicals. The water could well cause leaf
burn, if nothing else.

Some washing powders formulated for hard water areas contain enough
borax to be a real nuisance. My old man plumbed the outfall of the
washing machine into the barnyard, and it killed a peach tree in pretty
short order.

It made some very pretty pieces of wood, a couple of pistol stocks and a
new stock for an old air rifle. I wish I'd still got some of it - I've
just acquired two restorable percussion boxlock pistols, both requiring
new woodenbits.

Also I want a piece of fruitwood for a steeply-dropped butt on a
full-length flintlock rifle stock. Sort-of bent at the base. I had a
fine piece of wild cherry which was growing out of one of my hedges. It
was just the right size, and just the right shape, and, it was beginning
to show signs of dying-off, so I dug it out and sealed all the cut roots
and the cut top with wax and left it in the cart-store for a few years.
Being very hard-up when it was seasoned, and not knowing anyone who
could be relied upon to do a proper job with a whizzy-round saw, I put
it in a sawing horse and cut it down with a ripsaw. When the first plank
fell away it revealed a patch of rot in such a position that I couldn't
get a stock out of it at all.

While the wood wasn't wasted, I still have the ironwork for a New
England flintlock rifle waiting for attention...

Anyone?

--
Rusty
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