Nice one, thanks GYO

[TonyF]

Picked up a message from Sara at GYO to tell me I've won another £10 voucher from GYO for another spiffing gardening trick that I've picked up over the years.

That's £10 off another Haw's watering can from T&M which is what I used the first one for also.

Excellent

[rustylady]

Well done Tony - are you collecting watering cans?

[Nicos]

Well done Tony- which tip was that???

Well done Tony - are you collecting watering cans?

aye...he's a grand collection in the corner of his shed!!!

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2535/...fa8aa2d0_o.jpg

[TonyF]

I do have a few watering cans actually but not as many as the packets of seeds

French watering cans are, usually, big (capacity) badly balanced and poorly made and even in plastic, too expensive. To get anything good is prohibitively expensive and to me Haw's cans are like Felco secateurs, they're probably as good as it gets and they use them at kew and Wisley which is OK for me.

The tip was about using copper tape - and I seem to recall old copper piping - to deter slugs and snails

And as for the first tip about using polystyrene fish boxes to start seeds in and to keep pots warm or cool, saw a pic this morning in a French gardening mag for a posh garden and restaurant not too far from me and they use them to bring their seeds on.

[Janek]

G'Day Tony!

Our slugs and snails are not so easily fooled Down Under. I tried the copper deterent solution and the blighters crawled right over it without hesitation. There is one sure-fire way to deter slugs and snails and that's to surround your garden with a moat as they can't swim and will drown if they fall into water. The problem is the cost. It would be prohibitive.

You must be ambidextrous, being able to water plants with a watering can in each hand. We have some very poor watering cans on sale in Oz but I have a good one made from galvanised iron (it's already had its 30th birthday!) and a pretty good plastic one. I've done several repairs on each one to plug leaks etc and they are both leak-free at present so that's great! My plants love them.

OK, you GYO grapes, we all know what to get Tony for Christmas - more watering cans!

[Nicos]

G'Day Tony!

Our slugs and snails are not so easily fooled Down Under. I tried the copper deterent solution and the blighters crawled right over it without hesitation.

Ah yes- but did you wind it clockwise- or anticlockwise???

[wellie]

Oh goodness me, it feels like bumping into old friends here on The Vine now, and how scrumptious does that feel this late on Easter Sunday evening before I retire to Bedfordshire with my cat?!

TonyF, many congratulations my friend.X
Nicos, your sense of humour wickedly unleashes mine, and I have to curtail it for fear of rowing the boat too far out into the drink with Miss Marple still in it! You DO make me larf.....

However, I would like to take part in this thread, on a serious note, if I may?


Janek.....I've thought about this problem good and hard for you, and I've come up with what I think is a brilliant, brilliant solution. To be honest, I'm not sure that it will get published in The Oz Gardening Times, and realistically, it doesn't actually 'hold water' in terms of Viability on a large scale.......
But given YOUR theory, and Tony's, wouldn't it make sense to combine the two around the entire coast of OZ?!
(Sorry... There's always one British person you spend your life apologising for?!) X