Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Chatting => Frugal Living => Topic started by: muntjac on February 23, 2007, 23:42
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ok heres a couple qwikys ...... if you use garden canes it can be blooming dangerous if they get ya eyes in their sights so here's a tip for stopping that , if you shoot or have a mate as does ask for the used cartridges and pop them over the tops ,if not and ya got mates who drink :roll: hell who hasnt got a mate that drinks .well ask them if they buy cans of bitter that have the little balls in to save the tins for ya . cut them open carfully and remove the " agitators " they have a moulding hole in them that fits canes nicly if the cane is thick one just pare it down a bit to fit .make sure the cane end is flat tho folks . paint em bright red or a flashy colour and ur set .just store em up after ya use em in a carrier bag hanging in the greenhouse . oh and talking of greenhouses . those blooming pencils for writing the names on labels always get lost ..... ok well mine blooming do ,,,solution silicone a 4 inch pot to the glass in the entrance to the greenhouse just behind the door jam . store ya labels in there along with ya pencils :wink:
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And if you're a wine drinker, save the corks and shove them onto the ends. If you've got wine bottles with only screw tops, then you're missing out on some good stuff. :wink:
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And if you drink those yogurt type drinks like Actimel pop there empty bottles over the top of a cane, they are also good for making a net cage as well. :wink:
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i have to disagree with the cork verses screw cap post , you can get some really dandy wines with screw caps .even if they havent got the age factor in which corked wines usually have, even if in some cases it only a year or 2 .
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I've heard that all wines will gradually go over to screw caps, which are better than synthetic corks. Real cork is getting in to short supply.
Just found a bit pn the inet:
One thing that is starting to change is the wine industry's attitude towards cork stopper vs. screw cap. For the first time in history more people in a recent Gallop poll said that they preferred wine to beer as their drink of choice. As a result of the increased production by wineries, there is a greater chance that we could come down with a bottle of "corked" wine. The term "corked" means that mold has affected the cork, leaving the wine with a musty taste and smell. This can affect almost one in every twenty bottles of wine. Some of the major wine labels have responded by using synthetic corks, which really don't make sense because they are difficult to remove and almost impossible to reseal.
The screw cap, or Stelvin cap, is a more logical choice. They form a better seal and are very easy to screw back on. Consumer reaction to the screw caps has been good and growing all the time. Nothing is worse than showing off a very expensive bottle of wine, and then realizing after you open it that it's gone bad. A recent survey showed that about 60 percent of all American homes don't even have a corkscrew. Some of the wineries have been slow to change and the cork companies are working on making the natural cork more reliable using more sophisticated testing. Until then, it's down to a battle between the screw-cappers and the traditionalists, and it's up to the consumer to decide.
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I prefer these dinky little individual portions of wine ... 3 litre bag in box. If you are careful, you can make them last a second evening.
Seriously though, I like the boxes of wine because it keeps the air away from whatever is left. Not a huge selection, granted, but as long as it says Shiraz somewhere on the box then I'm happy.
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And you can reuse the bag inside the box as a water carrier should you need one, which is unlikely unless you are camping but you never know.
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As far as wine corks go, enjoy them while they last, even get friends to save them. Less obvious than a bottle flopping about. And an opened bottle of wine should be used within 2 weeks, not left to turn into vinegar. We don't get wine in bags here so I can't comment on them. :wink:
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For canes try and pick up these bags of kids play balls light plastyic about the size of a tennis ball dead cheap maybe a quid / 00 on a car boot or free if any are on freecycle. Get a sharp knilr and cut a cross then just put over the end of the cane
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Typical too i've just bought a new corkscrew! tut. I use old practice golf balls they're light and plastic with holes in 'em on the top of my canes but like the Actimel idea.
Seriously though, I like the boxes of wine because it keeps the air away from whatever is left. Not a huge selection, granted, but as long as it says Shiraz somewhere on the box then I'm happy.
I like the boxes too.....handier to carry on New Year's eve and they also sit very nicely on the steps in the garden which doubles as the bar in the Summer!
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As far as wine corks go, enjoy them while they last, even get friends to save them. Less obvious than a bottle flopping about. And an opened bottle of wine should be used within 2 weeks, not left to turn into vinegar. We don't get wine in bags here so I can't comment on them. :wink:
How do you get a bottle of wine to last 2 weeks? If I am really careful I can get 2 days out of 1 but I aren't usually careful, hic
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Wine doesn't get chance to turn into vinegar here, timescale for a bottle of wine is same as fluffypebble 2 days if careful
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My point exactly, Ann and Fluffy. If you get 'corking' , that fungal problem, then either it's a bad winery problem or it's been left too long after opening. I'm not a regular wine drinker so a bottle will last over a week for me. :wink:
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I`m still trying to work out how abottle could last 2 weeks unless it was not the first bottle of the evening,not finished and noone could remember if or where it was :lol: :shock: surley not!
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Two weeks? More like two hours here in O'Brien Towers. :wink:
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Sorry to disappoint, people, but a bottle of wine really does last over a week around here. I'm what the French call a continental drinker - I don't throw away the cork (or screw cap). Don't mind the occasional glass of wine but I'm not really much of a drinker. OH doesn't drink at all, but a lot of fun nonethless. Makes it harder in this house to collect corks for capping canes. :lol: :lol:
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Last year I bought a pack of play balls from tescos and they are usefull for topping canes and at £3 for around 50 very cheap and tho I usually utilse anything I can recycle, they looked really jolly and they stop nets from slipping down canes and you cant miss them so no poked eyes.
A really cool side effect of these is ......... I was having a bit of bother with birds attacking plants but they won't come near the coloured balls, they seem to have a 'scarecrow' effect so I didn't need to put nets where I put them
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And you can reuse the bag inside the box as a water carrier should you need one, which is unlikely unless you are camping but you never know.
They make a handy 'travel pillow' if you re-inflate them.
:lol: