Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts

"Chris Potts" wrote in message
...
Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts

There was a Chris Potts in Camp Hill Prison when I was in there in the 70's.
Not you by any chance was it?
..
..
..
..

Teaching I hasten to add :-))

Mike

The message
from Chris Potts contains these words:

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Fuel source with non-locked-in carbon

--
Rusty
horrid dot squeak snailything zetnet point co full-stop uk
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

Mike wrote:
"Chris Potts" wrote in message
...

Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts


There was a Chris Potts in Camp Hill Prison when I was in there in the 70's.
Not you by any chance was it?
.
.
.
.

Teaching I hasten to add :-))

Mike


No Mike not me, I have not been caught yet!


All the best,

Chris Potts

No Mike not me, I have not been caught yet!


All the best,

Chris Potts

Chris the chap in the next 'classroom' to me was teaching, of all things,
"Pottery" I kid you not.

I was in there to set up a course which would be used throughout the prison
service which, in theory, to give the 'inmates'
:-(( a trade they could persue when they came out. :-(((((( Wrong

Mike

Chris Potts wrote:

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Wood burning stove or open log fire for heating. Need to leave them a
year or two to dry out first. Logs sell for about £70/tonne round here.
Burning wood smells much nicer than other solid fuels.

Alternatively you could try growing shitake mushrooms on a log pile.
That would be both attractive and profitable if you have the space.
(also technically rather tricky to do)

Regards,
Martin Brown

try creating rustic arches
bird baths, feeders, rustic gates.
the list is almost endless


"Chris Potts" wrote in message
...
Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees and
collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5 inches
diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or used on
paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight feet long
and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what we could use
these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round our boundary
to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the thicker ones are
dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as edging for paths,
but this year we have a great surplus and we would like to do something
creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts

Chris Potts wrote:

Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches.
(snip)
but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

If you want a place in heaven, deliver your lot to me. Gets pretty cold
in winter in this drafty house )

ps. you don't happen to live in Cheshire do you?

On Wed, 16 Nov 2005 16:39:30 +0000, Chris Potts wrote:

but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight feet long
and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for?

A nice size for fuel. Where are you?

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

"Chris Potts" wrote in message
...
Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees and
collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5 inches
diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or used on
paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight feet long
and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what we could use
these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round our boundary
to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the thicker ones are
dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as edging for paths,
but this year we have a great surplus and we would like to do something
creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts

If they are fruit tree bits, please send them to me to use in my smoker
(I'll even come and pick them up if you live anywhere near Surrey)

I love to slow cook big hunks of meat with different types of wood.
Particular favourites are cherry with duck, apple with pork, etc, etc.....

Chris Potts wrote in message
...
Hello all,

We have quite a big garden and at this time of year we thin our trees
and collect quite a lot of branches. The bits that are under about 2.5
inches diameter go through the muncher and go on the compost heap or
used on paths, but that leaves us with lots of lengths up to say eight
feet long and up to six inches in diameter. Has any one any idea what
we could use these bits of wood for? In the past we have put them round
our boundary to rot down and provide food for invertebrates and the
thicker ones are dotted about in "artistic" heaps, and some are used as
edging for paths, but this year we have a great surplus and we would
like to do something creative.

Thanks you,

All the best,

Chris and Mavis Potts

Hi Chris and Mavis,

I do envy you this bounty. I am gradually building up a stack of dead wood
from trees and shrubs in my garden. Although I have a woodpile, I would
really love to make a 'creature tower'. I suppose this is a more
perpendicular form of your heap for invertebrates, but skillfully done, it
could make a very interesting feature in a wild or woodland garden. It
could incorporate a hedgehog house at the base, various
bee/ladybird/lacewing shelters on the way up, and a bird feeder or table at
or near the top. At its most basic, it would be an over-stuffed wigwam
arrangement, but for someone with d-i-y- skills a rustic tower or folly
could be built. I would like to start mine off with a low drystone wall
rotunda base, to defer rotting of the structural timbers. After that, I'll
just enjoy giving reign to my imagination, adding woven bird roosts and lawn
moss for nesting birds.

I know you could burn it for fuel, but that would only add to pollution
levels. Perhaps a creature tower is the very sort of creative 'something'
you had in mind?

Spider

Spider wrote:

I know you could burn it for fuel, but that would only add to pollution
levels. Perhaps a creature tower is the very sort of creative 'something'
you had in mind?

Not really true, burning wood is basically neutral as long as you are
growing new trees to replace the wood.

--
Chris Green

Spider wrote:

I know you could burn it for fuel, but that would only add to pollution
levels. Perhaps a creature tower is the very sort of creative 'something'
you had in mind?

Wood rotting naturally by fungal action also releases dioxins. There is
no free lunch. Pristine woodlands actually have detectable levels of
dioxin from natural sources (with or without recent forest fires).

It comes from the way fungal enzymes attack lignin in wood...

Regards,
Martin Brown

Martin Brown wrote in message
...
Spider wrote:

I know you could burn it for fuel, but that would only add to pollution
levels. Perhaps a creature tower is the very sort of creative
'something'
you had in mind?

Wood rotting naturally by fungal action also releases dioxins. There is
no free lunch. Pristine woodlands actually have detectable levels of
dioxin from natural sources (with or without recent forest fires).

It comes from the way fungal enzymes attack lignin in wood...

Regards,
Martin Brown

Thanks, Chris and Martin, for this insight. I doubt there are such things
as 'friendly' dioxins, but at least the fungal interaction you describe is
natural. I'm obliged to allow, also, that fire can be a useful cleanser.
Alas, it is indiscriminate.

I shall still contemplate my creature tower, however, because I know it will
be colonised by many small and, often beneficial, creatures. If these
reduce the number of chemicals I use, then I will be a very happy gardener.

Spider

Spider wrote:

Martin Brown wrote in message
...

Wood rotting naturally by fungal action also releases dioxins. There is
no free lunch. Pristine woodlands actually have detectable levels of
dioxin from natural sources (with or without recent forest fires).

It comes from the way fungal enzymes attack lignin in wood...

Thanks, Chris and Martin, for this insight. I doubt there are such things
as 'friendly' dioxins, but at least the fungal interaction you describe is
natural. I'm obliged to allow, also, that fire can be a useful cleanser.
Alas, it is indiscriminate.

Natural toxins and venoms are no better or worse than synthetic ones.

But for balance I should point out that although the press has a field
day with dioxins only a few of them are really nasty. And even then the
main short term risk is a bad case of chloracne. The stuff we should be
very worried about are the PCBs that the dioxins are an impurity in.

Belgium managed to add enough dioxin and PCB laden transformer oil into
commercial chicken feed to kill some animals outright and had to remove
all eggs and poultry and some meat from supermarket shelves when I was
living there.

http://www.ifst.org/dioxedb.htm

I think the analyst who eventually went public on this out of total
frustration when the Belgian authorities prevaricated for weeks on end
was fired.

I shall still contemplate my creature tower, however, because I know it will
be colonised by many small and, often beneficial, creatures. If these
reduce the number of chemicals I use, then I will be a very happy gardener.

Worth trying to cultivate shitake mushrooms in a wood pile.

Regards,
Martin Brown