Found in front of Weeds HQ on St. Patrick’s day morning (below) this strange home-made hat stand/large cat scratcher is now in place in the garden for use later this season. What do you think we should have trained up it? A clematis, some sweet peas or runner beans perhaps? Let’s see how the mood takes us. To its left is the window frame we found years ago and to its right a mirror originally left out for the bin men. Isn’t it great what you find in the street?
When passing a builder’s skip do “keep ’em peeled” (as Shaw Taylor used to say) as you never know what you may find. We at Weeds have bagged all sorts over the years including a collection of terracotta pots complete with a bag of multipurpose compost, a nearly new IKEA table and even a carrier bag full of Happy Hardcore singles (also this lot in the bottom of the picture below). Some things will come in handy in the garden but if not, they can be stuck on ebay and any profit made can be put towards buying plants/seeds etc. A win win situation!
Be clever when looking through a skip though, don’t jump up and down in it like an excited child, a sly glance when walking past then a quick swiping movement (in and out) with the hand will suffice. Alys Fowler in The Thrifty Gardener mentions if she sees something of interest she will always ask the owner of the skip first out of politeness before actually taking it. She may have a point.
Once while driving past a skip with our good friend “The Portuguese man with a van” (number on request) we noticed some lovely pieces of timber suitable for making a raised bed. We got out and inspected the wood which was ideal width-wise but far too long to get into the van. Our man then disappeared into the back of his vehicle and procured a saw, problem solved! Whilst he was perched on the top of the skip just about to make the first cut, a very irate man came out of the house opposite shouting at the top of his voice “WHAT THE XXXX ARE YOU DOING?” with his wife in tow trying to calm him down. It turns out the wood had just been delivered and was going to be used the next day for his loft conversion. Thank god we found out just in time or that would’ve been an expensive raised bed! Ask first if unsure.
As well as skips, do have a lookout for stuff left out for the binmen and items left outside houses attached with a note saying “take me” on it. Remember rifling through other peoples dustbins is illegal and if caught you will end up on some sort of register and certainly be given an ASBO.
Seek and you will find! #getstuckintoaskip
*Sung to Crass’ “Banned from the Roxy”
A big shout to our old friend Ben M for getting in touch with a pic of some nice bike rack-style recycling using one of those plastic mushroom trays mentioned in the “Left out for the binmen, OK” post last month. The bike is carrying some healthy plants on their way to his well tidy allotment in Leyton (below). I wish my garden was as weed free as that! Clever use of a plastic tray, ta Ben. Please send us your pics showing your usage of a mushroom plastic tray to onedeckpete (at) gmail (dot) com
Weeds up to me knees 