re potatoes in tyres...anyone got data?

[digiveg]

I watched Gardener's World last night and saw the nice crop of spuds they got from a stack of tyres. Great, I thought. Then I saw that they were painted with a glossy green paint on the outside...not so great, I thought.

Then I got to thinking some more. I once worked - very, very briefly - in a Firestone tyre factory in London. There's a LOT more than rubber in tyres, and I wonder if anyone has any data about what breaks down from them, or what leaches into the soil through watering, over the growing period.

Tyres always seemed sort of, well, toxic to me. I wouldn't want to drink out of one - and until I know more I don't want to eat out of one, either - and definitely not if it's painted glossy green!

Does anyone have facts and figures on this?

[Chickpea]

Good points, digiveg. I don't know any of the answers to your questions but they're darned good questions. I know people used to use railway sleepers to make raised beds before there were questions raised about the stuff they impregnate the sleepers with leaching into the veggies.

[digiveg]

Yeah...seems to me that everyone (well, most everyone) is really keen to compost paper, use railway sleepers, plant in tyres, etc etc without having any idea AT ALL about the possible results.

Even if the results are teeny, really really small, so what? Do we think that nobody is going to come after us? That the land somehow stops being used when we, er, move on? Just about every time we do something (that turns out to be) stupid, we're leaving it to someone else to clean up - if they can!

I reckon people don't really think about their actions very much at all - just assume that what they believe is 'right' somehow, and that therefore it's OK.

That's why I don't kill anything in my garden...(and yes, Hedgewizard, that was for you...derris aside. It's karma that's the problem, not derris...).

Koan: what's the sound of one caterpillar/snail/slug/aphid dying?

Answer: a worldly accolade

[bazil]

this had crossed my mind a bit

two points

whats in the newspaper ink is it dodgy?

arnt railway sleepers treated with carcinogenic chemicals (creosote?) to stop them rotting ,does it stay in the wood or does it leach out into the soil?

[the.fee.fairy]

I've always composted my newspaper...after its had a spell in the rats' cage. As far as i was aware, the ink is now vegetable based rather than toxin based as in the past.

Please enlighten me otherwise though :D

[Martin]

c'mon, spill the beans, how do you get the newspapers from 10 Downing Street?

[bazil]

they dont have newspapers there....thats where they write the news....i think theyre ad libbing as we speak

[digiveg]

Black ink is usually pretty benign. Not always, though - it's not just the pigments we should be aware of, but the 'carrier' used to bind them into something which can be stuck on paper. That's usually a petroleum-based oil.

Bleached paper contains dioxins. Only a very, very small amount of that leaches into the soil, but any at all is too much for me. I want my grandchildren to grow here with confidence, too. I therefore assume that whatever I do is cumulative to some degree, so I ONLY do what is likely to be 100% safe.

Even if it's not my grandchildren, it's someone's grandchildren...

Colored inks are far more problematic. Although many inks are now 'soy based', i.e. not using petroleum oils as a binder, the pigments may contain heavy metals like cadmium and cobalt as well as lots of other lovely chemicals you don't really want in your garden. Best way is to check up - and if the publisher can't tell you, don't use it.

Cuprinol and other wood-preserving 'treatments' is toxic stuff; you certainly wouldn't want to drink it, so why would you want to put it somewhere in the garden? I admit this doesn't hold true for everything, after all I'm not going to start advocating drinking horse-poo tea...but I'm sure you get my drift. The pressure treatment that leaves wood looking green also leaves it containing both copper salts and arsenic. Of course, all the above are supposed to be safe...personally I think that's a load of hooey, and that sometime in the next 20 years we'll hear that, oh, sorry, but actually it's rather bad for the earth, too...bit late after you've been eating from it for all that time!

As to how to get the papers from No 10 - er, ask nicely? This assumes they're literate enough to read 'em. They're certainly not green enough to avoid 'em...

[the.fee.fairy]

Haha, my ratties are much nicer than 10 downing Street! They bite you rahter than satb you in the back...and they're not up the arses of some rat in another country...

I was told that newspapers now use vegetable inks...hence the being safe for the ratties, and being safe for compost too. The do, however, ocasionally carry rat lice eggs (and possible some other lice eggs...) I found this out when the two little boys i had once got lice. They cleared up soon though :D

[bazil]

i saw ray mears preserving wood with natural pine tar......it looked raelly fun stuff to make