Re: Plant Labels - from used aluminium cans

[Frogleg]

This subject came up recently and I was going to suggest just buying plastic plant markers. Then searched for them in the places I used to buy them, and they seemed in rather short supply. And a lot more expensive than I remember. The availibility of old mini (or maxi?) blinds, plastic jugs, etc., plus the labor of slicing 'em up seemed like a lot more trouble than just buying pre-cut labels and and outdoor marking pen. When I was heavily into growing greenhouse veg plants, I got packs of 50 or 100 plastic labels for a very reasonable price. I *do* agree with "waste not; want not" but only of one's own labor (and materials and tools involved) are over-plentiful.

[Phisherman]

I like the labels made from the narrow plastic venetitian blind slats. For the lettering ink from a perm sharpie pen will eventually fade, but I've used enamel paint that lasts a long time.

[animaux]

That's correct, but I no longer buy soda in cans for my husband. I only buy plastic bottles and they all go to the recycle municipality in our city. There was a report, and I don't remember where, but I do recall it was credible that there is a lot of aluminum found in the soda they house. I never bought another can and only used frozen vegetables unless they come from my soil.

some sort of alloy primarily made up of aluminum. I also use parchment paper to cover oven cooked meals and put the aluminum over the paper so not to touch the food.

It may all be silly and a part of the grand fear machine in the U.S. Who knows.

I-did-not-know-that!

V

[David Hill]

Nice smooth stones with the plant name painted on looks great. Something to do in the winter.

[Bill Spohn]

Guys - here is a source for plant tags -

type that you impress with a ballpoint works very well as there is no ink to wash off or fade.

California Plastics has inexpensive aluminum tags that last years :

(first product on the top of the page)

[Don K]

Most mining involves dealing with nasty by-products.

A lot of gold is also obtained by refining ore thru all sorts of chemical processes. Yet we don't refer to it as man-made gold. There's no alchemy involved. It's just recovering the gold that is locked up in other compounds.

Gold can be toxic to the liver and kidneys. Perhaps a prudent person should stop wearing man-made gold while avoiding aluminum.

Don

[paghat]

Never heard about gold being toxic -- I guess I better not bury my great horde of dubloons in the garden -- but I've seen piles of extremely toxic rubble left over from gold mining.

I still sorta feel there's a difference between gold which DOES exist in a pure state naturally (in addition to dissolved state in the ocean & finely powdered in some environments, & aluminum which as an ore is bauxite of quite a different character altogether. If pure god did NOT exist in nature until purified by human hands, I would regard it as man-made, yes, just as the transuranic elements can mainly only be brought about by the activity of scientists. But anyway, my only point was that the aluminum deposits in alzheimer-sufferers' brains is the stuff people purify, rather than resembling the ore that exists in dusty aspect in everyone's gardens. So either the brain's electrical charges must manufacturer it from the environment, or what SEEMS more likely, our daily exposure to created aluminum is making some of us stupider than we used to be. Here's a web article about the bits I worry about (from a school of biology p.o.v. rather than my ecology worry-wart p.o.v.):

[Salty Thumb]

"Don K" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

The difference is refined or man-made gold is more or less indistinguishible from naturally occuring pure gold (and nobody's saying gold isn't found in ore, although I question, historically, how gold has been recovered by refining from ores vs. how much was just laying around, more or less pure), whereas you just don't find sheets of aluminum or aluminum oxide lying around. Well, you might if you live in a junky neighborhood, but you still know it's in an unnatural state.

I can see how that could be a problem if you go around looking like Mr. T or have some Trumpesqe fascination with gilding things like spoons, forks and cups. But unless you're eating gold flakes for breakfast, it's still not quite the same.

Drinking too much water *can* be toxic, but nobody's saying stop drinking water.

- Salty

[Franz Heymann]

By your reckoning practically all metals are man-made, as is concrete. I find it hard to think of anything other than wood which would by your standards be "natutal"

Franz Heymann

[Franz Heymann]

There are no such things as gold ores to my knowledge. Gold is an almost inert element. As far as I know, gold is always found as a simple metal.

Franz Heymann

[Salty Thumb]

"Franz Heymann" wrote in news:bf377f$4hd$ [e-mail]:

Gold has low reactivity, but isn't near as unreactive as the 'noble gases' (but I hear you can even make compounds with one of the heavier elements, Xenon?) . The one thing I remember is telluride ore, I'm not sure if that means tellurium or rare earth elements in general. I also don't know if it's chemically or merely mechanically bound.

-- Salty

[Ned Flanders]

It's compounds are, but gold worn as jewelry or eaten on desserts or drunk in liquor are for the most part inert and not readily absorbed by the body therefore not a concern.

Cheers,

Ned

[madgardener]

[Dwight Sipler]

Lots of label ideas out there. I've probably missed a few, but the painted rock sounds best to me. Available materials, simple to make, non-toxic (depending on the paint) and fairly permanent.

[Salty Thumb]

[e-mail] (Ned Flanders) wrote in news: [e-mail]:

According to top yahoo hits, the only mineral listed above that contains gold is calaverite (gold telluride), the other four are "ores" of copper (chalcos being Greek for copper). But of course, if you're willing to trade some of your gold nuggets for my copper pans, you've got a deal. :-)

[Salty Thumb]

"Franz Heymann" wrote in news:bf4alg$5rr$ [e-mail]:

Here's a site that agrees with us:

"There are very few true gold ores, besides native gold, because it forms a major part of only a few rare minerals, it is found as little more than a trace in a few others or it is alloyed to a small extent with other metals such as silver. "

and

"A few of the tellurides are nagyagite, calaverite, sylvanite and krennerite. These are all minor ores of gold but their contributions to the supply of gold pales next to native gold's own contribution. "

-- Salty

[paghat]

You can also get a mess of rocks about the size of your head and line them up along the driveway & paint them in all sorts of bright colors! But to be subtle, paint every other one white, the rest yellow, using that rubberized paint that's for highway centerlines, it lasts quite a while. If the yellow & white painted rocks clash with the house, repaint the house schoolbus yellow.

-paghat the ratgirl

[David Hill]

What is the relevance of gold mining to Plant labels???????? I can see a gold mine would help to buy all the plants we would like to have.

[Salty Thumb]

"David Hill" wrote in news:bf4g4c $tdm$ [e-mail]:

sorry, I should have modified the subject line earlier

here's an idea from NutGen:

self labeling tomato plants - as a tomato plant grows, the name and cultivar gradually appears on the stem. Currently, the names are only available in Italian, but English versions should be available 2Q 2005.

and here's a martha stewarty idea:

take a picture of a plant or pluck off a leaf dry it in isopropyl alcohol (if using a leaf) or otherwise dessicate write name on picture (if using picture) laminate the sucker or intomb in polyurethane. scratch name into polyurethane (if using leaf) rub some native gold into the scratched name add a couple more layers of poly for good measure put outside next to plant

[Don K]

Gold is not absorbed well by the body and its compounds are not normally particularly toxic. Up to 50% of arthritic patients treated with gold-containing drugs may show toxic effects however resulting in damage to the liver and to the kidneys.

was being sarcastic. I'm not concerned about the toxicity of aluminum or gold and I'm not going to avoid either one just because someone comes up with an inconclusive factoid that it may be toxic.

If the scientific or medical community ever makes a judgment that these metals should be avoided, then I will listen. Until then, it's just another crackpot idea for alarmists to get themselves worked up over.

Don