Today's DIY

[Capitol]

Oh, I forgot one. Bought new wireless mouse £4 from Home Bargains, used on Windows computer, wouldn't work. Used it on Linux computer, perfect!

[Dave Liquorice]

That's what we have, mixture of grasses and some patches of nettles that seem remarkably resistent to strimming, in that they get strimmed to ground level at least twice a year but still come back as strong as ever.

Various grasses, some tussucks, a few wild flowers and trees that we planted 15 years ago some of which getting to be 4" dia, 15' high and a bent by the wind... Where the grass likes it, it'll get to good 4 or 5 feet high.

Thistles don't come back if you pull 'em up and get most of the root. I wait until there has been a good bit of rain and the soil is soft, push a fork fully into the ground a few inches from thistle lever up, move fork 90 degrees repeat, pull thistle out. Tough gloves are adviseable. B-) Field over the road had a fair number of thistles that would have gone to seed if I hadn't sneaked across and pulled 'em all up. TBH much to my surprise they haven't come back.

Dock isn't much of a problem for us. Nettles, see above. Ragwort was scattered all over the place but a few years of pulling up before seeding has basically put paid to that as well. It's still in the "lawn" but in it's non-flowering rossette form as it gets mowed.

Hum yes, I found my water pump pliers in between a couple of vertical stones on top of a drystone wall. Didn't know I'd lost 'em...

Still not found snips, not looking for them now but looking for the offcut of 3 mm braided curtain draw cord to tie into a monkey fist to make a pull on a bifold door.

[Dave Liquorice]

Or you aren't progressing along the hedge dragging the cable as you move forward. Also tuck a loop of cable through your belt at the small of your back, leaving only just enough slack to the trimmer to not limit its movement.

[Steve Walker]

Councils were recently ibstructed that they should not be charging for DIY waste, only for commercial builders' waste.

SteveW

[Steve Walker]

Smooth the edges of the holes and apply small blobs of silicone and they essentially disappear.

SteveW

[Robin]

Can you tell us where you saw that?

What I have seen reported[1] was not instructions from DCLG so much as a statement of the law that tried to curry favour with voters - viz. that "household waste generated by DIY should be disposed of without a charge.?

Note that the precise words and their order matters. So the above is not the same as "Waste generated by DIY in a house should be disposed of without a charge."

Some councillors have argued that "DIY waste and household waste are the same thing." But that ain't how the legislation is framed. And IIRC the interpretation was that DIY waste counts as household waste if it comes from work a householder would *normally* carry out.

It's also hard to see how councils supposed to tell the difference between one load of bricks, plaster etc and another. They certainly can't use "is it a van": I've seen an MPV shuttling between the local tip and the dropside truck parked 200m away.

The only change in the law I have seen was back in 2015[2] to bar charges for "household waste". And even that allows some charges to run on until 2020.

[1] eg [2] The Local Authorities (Prohibition of Charging Residents to Deposit Household Waste) Order 2015

[Steve Walker]

No, I can't remember.

Maybe I was taken in by it.

What is normal? My grandfather, father, uncles, myself have all carried out any and all DIY work on any scale. That is normal for us. Other families don't even paint or paper.

They can see the same vehicles coming back again and again. To the extent that it is obvious that it is not a resident doing a lot of work on their house for a period or even lots of smaller jobs over a long period, but a business running continuously. Many tips use numberplate recognition for this.

[Andy Burns]

I thought it was "recommended" rather than "instructed", in some waste and recycling strategic report rushed out before the election?

[Graeme]

In message , Andrew writes

Our local site is very informal, comprising two dust carts parked in the council yard on Saturday morning. One cart for garden waste, the other for general rubbish. They are very good, and will take almost anything. They do, not unreasonably, draw the line at stuff like old engine oil, fridges, car batteries etc. They happily took a complete bathroom suite (no, not the cracked one!) from me recently, plus a million broken wall tiles and assorted detritus. Being a village site, they know exactly who the traders are, and who the local residents are.

With the nearest proper dump 25 miles away, they doubtless know that too rigid a policy would encourage fly tipping.

[Graeme]

Oh yes, I know how to do it properly, but both times I had finished a run, then saw one little bit sticking out, and, without thinking, sliced it - and the cable. Cannot believe I did it twice in one morning. Had only ever sliced the cable once before. The only good news was that, having done it once before, there was already a cable joiner in place.

[Graeme]

In message , Huge writes

Interesting question. There is a field, or meadow, near here, where I walk the dog, and I have never seen any form of maintenance in 15 years, yet it comprises wild flowers and grasses, without any patches of nettles, brambles, docks etc. I've never seen it mown, sprayed, weeded or anything. Probably around 100 yards square.

Why do some areas remain just grasses and flowers while others turn into an impenetrable jungle?

[The Natural Philosopher]

Which is a large argument in favour of devolution and non centralisation.

[The Natural Philosopher]

no patch of land inst managed by something. Depends on the soil type.

And what lives there. Rabbits will crop grass to a very low level.

So will sheep

But its unusual not to see trees take root - but an annual whack down with a mower fixes that.

[Tim Lamb]

In message , Graeme writes

Long term grazing by livestock, particularly horses, can do this. The land surface becomes compacted through trampling. Nutrients are carried off as collected horse shit and not replaced.

Wildflowers (weeds to a farmer) such as dandelion, buttercup, daisy etc. thrive because they are unpalatable and do not require much nitrogen.

Nettles need good fertility and are reckoned to be a sign of human habitation.

>

[charles]

That's why I use aa petrol one - oh and the hedge is 300yds long

[charles]

paricularly if there are squirrels about.

[Huge]

That's what glyphosate is for... :o)

Lord, I'm not doing that. I sprayed some of the bigger patches with selective weedkiller a few weeks ago - I must walk down and have a look at them.

[16 lines snipped]

The roofer finally found my rubber hammer - on the roof where I'd left it several years before - I'd been dressing some lead round the chimney stack.

[Steve Walker]

Our local tip has tank disguised as a giant plastic oil can for that.

There are cages to put those in.

Ours does that too.

And asbestos roof sheets as long as they are double wrapped, metal, timber, rubble, garden waste, small electical appliances, large electrical appliances.

We've never had anything refused.

Being a village site, they know exactly

Ours supposedly has number plate recognition cameras, so they know who's going there five days a week!

Our proper one is about 4 miles away, but I often go to one 9 miles away because it is far, far easier to park up with a trailer on and there seems little point in carrying messy rubbish in the back of the car.

SteveW

[Dave Liquorice]

Think our nearest is 16 miles but we don't get a local "saturday morning" dust cart. Wouldn't sunday afternoon be better though to take all the rubbish generated in the previous day and half. B-)

[Bill Wright]

For a square plot that's more than a acre.

Bill