|
|
Post by owdboggy on Sept 19, 2008 12:23:07 GMT 1
 I have just altered the shape of one of our lawns (Hah!, should be called non-gardened area) to make turning the mower a little easier. It has left a piece of land only about a metre wide and say 3 metres long. So far I have removed 2 x 2 gallon buckets of scrap metal, crockery, glass, slate etc. and 2 wheelbarrows full of broken bricks. The 'soil' itself is best described as subsoil, certainly not good quality topsoil. The annoying thing is that if one digs down through this rubbish, about 2 feet down, you come to really good top soil. At sometime some philistine (I can think of a better word, but the censor won't let it through) has dumped wagon loads of rubbish on this part of the garden for some reason or other. It makes my blood boil. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! And we are not talking of a small area either, it extends to about a third of the garden, so it must have been a fair number of loads! Deliberate vandalism or sheer ignorant stupidity.
|
|
|
|
Post by mickthecactus on Sept 19, 2008 12:50:11 GMT 1
I have the same problem OB.
One of the past occupants of my house was a builder who simply used to dig a big hole and dump all his rubbish in it. It would need a JCB to remove much of it. Eventually I put top soil on it and turfed it but the resultant area is not the greatest as the soil disappears and the sand comes through plus half bricks, roof tiles etc etc.
|
|
|
|
Post by 4pygmies on Sept 19, 2008 14:42:55 GMT 1
That's appalling isn't it? It never ceases to amaze me what people shove into the ground without a thought.....  I am beset by buried plastic bags and huge tangles of baler twine...........even the occasional cow horn as my garden is where the farmer used to park all his tractors and rubbish......and you NEVER find anything useful or valuable do you? Humph....... |
|
|
|
Post by madonplants on Sept 19, 2008 15:21:15 GMT 1
That's appalling isn't it? It never ceases to amaze me what people shove into the ground without a thought..... I am beset by buried plastic bags and huge tangles of baler twine...........even the occasional cow horn as my garden is where the farmer used to park all his tractors and rubbish...... and you NEVER find anything useful or valuable do you? Humph....... I don't know, Craig found some fossils, in our garden in Oakham! ;D I know what you mean though. I remember Geoff Hamilton's First Time Garden series (and what a series it was) and he was doing a new garden. I thought he said, during it, that if you explained to the builder, that you were interested in gardening, they would help you out. I think he also said that builders knew they had to be more careful where gardens were concerned, anyway. Our new house in Corby, didn't have toooooo bad a garden, though I did find quite a bit of rubble, while I was double digging it, maybe the odd bit of wire as well. I remember on a fishing forum, a guy would say how he would get rid of his bits at the end of the day. You know, odd bits of line, hooks, weights etc. He would dig a small hole, (so he took a shovel with him, did he?) put all his 'bits' in a plastic carrier bag and you know where I am going now don't you?  Had to explain a few things to him. Maybe he was a builder too!!  I feel for you OB, especially on the scale you are talking about, madness, sheer madness. |
|
|
|
Post by owdboggy on Sept 19, 2008 16:13:22 GMT 1
At least this bit will be mostly gravel path, so all I have had to do is clear the top spit. When we did the pond....................... Try digging your way through an old rubbish pit. Sadly the further down we dug the more broken everything was, pity as the bottom was full of Victorian glass stuff.
Please do not mention baler twine, it is the bane of my life. To get rid of one tiny strand which is about to wrap itself round the lawn mower blade, you have to remove 10 sq. foot of turf! Scream!!!!!!
|
|
|
|
Post by emseypop on Sept 19, 2008 16:56:43 GMT 1
We seem to have half an ice-cream van under my green house, I keep finding metal objects and the old fashioned metal signs that went on the side of it. There's tons of half bricks up there too. Keep up the hard work OB your garden looks lovely-you never know what lurks beneath the surface.  |
|
|
|
Post by cheerypeabrain on Sept 19, 2008 18:14:45 GMT 1
The only things we ever dig up are the odd golf ball and a few bits of lego.....our garden used to back onto the golf course (before they built a flipping great estate on there!) and was originally part of the golf course...just the scrubby bit o'course |
|
|
|
Post by Sweetleaf on Sept 19, 2008 21:23:21 GMT 1
I found a miners buckle in my garden, it comes from a south african mine  (I have a clause in my mortgage deeds that says the land under my house can be mined again if the conglomerate that used to mine the area wishes..... over my dead body! ) |
|
|
|
Post by 4pygmies on Sept 19, 2008 21:35:11 GMT 1
Oooer.....really? Does that mean you have lots of holes under all the houses still?? Crunchies......
One cold winter day years ago, in the leek shed, Nick and I dreamed up a character called Baler Twine........he's a lonesome cowboy, who drifts in and out of people's lives, wears an ancient cowboy hat and drawls in a deep and manly voice....one day he walked into the leek shed "Hi there.....my name Baler...Baler Twine........" he said, as I stood wrapped gorgeously in black plastic, 23 layers of old fleeces, rubber gloves, wellies and an outsize grey woolly hat. "My, li'l lady" he said,staring at me with those twinkly brown, long lashed and strangely attractive eyes of his, "You look as if you could do with some heat there..." and he bent forward, snapped a leek crate into kindling and blew on the end of his cigar.......
Such a nice man, that Baler........
|
|
|
|
Post by Sleepy on Sept 19, 2008 21:37:31 GMT 1
Oooer.....really? Does that mean you have lots of holes under all the houses still?? Crunchies...... One cold winter day years ago, in the leek shed, Nick and I dreamed up a character called Baler Twine........he's a lonesome cowboy, who drifts in and out of people's lives, wears an ancient cowboy hat and drawls in a deep and manly voice....one day he walked into the leek shed "Hi there.....my name Baler...Baler Twine........" he said, as I stood wrapped gorgeously in black plastic, 23 layers of old fleeces, rubber gloves, wellies and an outsize grey woolly hat. "My, li'l lady" he said,staring at me with those twinkly brown, long lashed and strangely attractive eyes of his, "You look as if you could do with some heat there..." and he bent forward, snapped a leek crate into kindling and blew on the end of his cigar....... Such a nice man, that Baler........ Oooohhhh.... I can see a new adventure story in the budding: 'The Adventures of Baler Twine' |
|
|
|
Post by 4pygmies on Sept 19, 2008 21:42:33 GMT 1
I guess he could just mosey thru again soon..........haven't seen him for a while..........he rides a huge chestnut horse called Moose, you know........... Is it about time we had a very silly story do you think? Oops, sorry OB, I seem to have taken your thread on a little walk.......... |
|
|
|
Post by madonplants on Sept 19, 2008 22:51:45 GMT 1
I have just altered the shape of one of our lawns (Hah!, should be called non-gardened area) to make turning the mower a little easier. It has left a piece of land only about a metre wide and say 3 metres long. So far I have removed 2 x 2 gallon buckets of scrap metal, crockery, glass, slate etc. and 2 wheelbarrows full of broken bricks. The 'soil' itself is best described as subsoil, certainly not good quality topsoil. The annoying thing is that if one digs down through this rubbish, about 2 feet down, you come to really good top soil. At sometime some philistine (I can think of a better word, but the censor won't let it through) has dumped wagon loads of rubbish on this part of the garden for some reason or other. It makes my blood boil. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! And we are not talking of a small area either, it extends to about a third of the garden, so it must have been a fair number of loads! Deliberate vandalism or sheer ignorant stupidity. ..... but in the days before refuse collections rubbish was buried. What do you think happens to the refuse collections now then, The witch? |
|
|
|
Post by owdboggy on Sept 20, 2008 9:11:25 GMT 1
There were no rural bin collections here until quite recently and yes domestic refuse was buried. We find pitts in various parts of the garden where there is broekn glass, crockery, rusty tins etc. One expects that sort of thing, anything biodgradable has gone. We have a fine collection of old bottles which have survived the burying. What I was complaining about is the dumping across a large piece of land, of the kind of material which was always used for foundations etc. This is not 'old' stuff, thie material is modern. If we dig down further in the garden we do find Tudor house bricks from a house which stood here in the 1600's (sadly mostly broken, whole ones are quite valuable).
What is interesting though is that the garden slopes quite considerably now from the road down to the fileds, it makes one wonder how much more of a slope there was before this 2 foot thick layer of ruibble was added.
|
|
|
|
Post by owdboggy on Sept 20, 2008 9:12:47 GMT 1
PS. Write away 4P, not my style of story!  |
|
|
|
Post by Sleepy on Sept 20, 2008 9:48:15 GMT 1
..... but in the days before refuse collections rubbish was buried. What do you think happens to the refuse collections now then, The witch? Ahhhh... I know this. They get us to seperate it out into different types. Then they collect it, bury part of it, and ship the rest to India to big dumps they think we don't know about. |
|
|
|
Post by cheerypeabrain on Sept 20, 2008 18:40:27 GMT 1
I guess he could just mosey thru again soon..........haven't seen him for a while..........he rides a huge chestnut horse called Moose, you know........... Is it about time we had a very silly story do you think? Oops, sorry OB, I seem to have taken your thread on a little walk.......... Go for it babe.... |
|
|
|
Post by Biggles on Sept 20, 2008 20:40:21 GMT 1
I have had a good day in the garden-and thought I would 'dig' the bed on the other side of the path--My moan--
Just found out that the depth of soil is only about 1ft --How on earth the Shrubs that are growing in this border have managed to get their roots below this I dont know!.They must have been planted when they were just 'cuttings'--
I will have to think about raising the level of soil or just leave well alone. Too much like hard work--Bigs
|
|
|
|
Post by maggyd on Sept 20, 2008 21:30:45 GMT 1
There were no rural bin collections here until quite recently and yes domestic refuse was buried. We find pitts in various parts of the garden where there is broekn glass, crockery, rusty tins etc. One expects that sort of thing, anything biodgradable has gone. We have a fine collection of old bottles which have survived the burying. What I was complaining about is the dumping across a large piece of land, of the kind of material which was always used for foundations etc. This is not 'old' stuff, thie material is modern. If we dig down further in the garden we do find Tudor house bricks from a house which stood here in the 1600's (sadly mostly broken, whole ones are quite valuable). What is interesting though is that the garden slopes quite considerably now from the road down to the fileds, it makes one wonder how much more of a slope there was before this 2 foot thick layer of ruibble was added. There you go OB ;D contact the TIME TEAM and have Tony Robinson & Co come and dig trenches!! tell them about the Tudor House and they will be there like a shot  they never find much it could make a change or them. |
|
|
|
Post by bogmyrtle on Sept 22, 2008 13:25:50 GMT 1
Where my father's family lived there is a motorbike & sidecar buried in the garden - or at least they buried it during the war when they couldn't get petrol!!!! I did ask Dad why they didn't just sell it, but he didn't really know but probably couldn't find someone to sell it to! Strange family.
Wonder what is left of it - I know the address!
|
|
|
|
Post by Sleepy on Sept 22, 2008 13:53:58 GMT 1
Where my father's family lived there is a motorbike & sidecar buried in the garden - or at least they buried it during the war when they couldn't get petrol!!!! I did ask Dad why they didn't just sell it, but he didn't really know but probably couldn't find someone to sell it to! Strange family. Wonder what is left of it - I know the address! It's probably past repairing Myrtle ;D |
|
|
|
Post by bogmyrtle on Sept 22, 2008 13:58:38 GMT 1
Where my father's family lived there is a motorbike & sidecar buried in the garden - or at least they buried it during the war when they couldn't get petrol!!!! I did ask Dad why they didn't just sell it, but he didn't really know but probably couldn't find someone to sell it to! Strange family. Wonder what is left of it - I know the address! It's probably past repairing Myrtle ;D I know, shame really, we do have a photograph of it somewhere. it still seems an odd thing to do, but that's his family! |
|
|
|
Post by 4pygmies on Sept 22, 2008 16:10:10 GMT 1
I think a lot of machinery was buried after the war.........near me there is an ex-army camp (now a sheep field) where, it is rumoured, the Americans buried tons of jeeps, lorries, and other equipment after the war. There are many airforce and army bases with rumours like that in East Anglia.....who knows if they're true?
|
|
|
|
Post by devondumpling on Sept 23, 2008 7:59:34 GMT 1
the people that lived here have managed to bury concrete block walls and a path that runs the length of the garden, covered it with topsoil and turfed it it was far too much for us to dig up, so I've had to work the garden round it, stupid people |
|
|
|
Post by bogmyrtle on Sept 23, 2008 8:33:31 GMT 1
I think a lot of machinery was buried after the war.........near me there is an ex-army camp (now a sheep field) where, it is rumoured, the Americans buried tons of jeeps, lorries, and other equipment after the war. There are many airforce and army bases with rumours like that in East Anglia.....who knows if they're true? I think you are right 4pygmies about the machinery after the war, but it just seems strange that a man would dig a big hole and bury both the motorbike & sidecar! Why not just leave it and hope someone steals it? They only had a terraced house - must have taken up what was left of the garden after the air raid shelter was put in! |
|
|
|
Post by debbiem on Sept 23, 2008 9:16:44 GMT 1
the people that lived here have managed to bury concrete block walls and a path that runs the length of the garden, covered it with topsoil and turfed it it was far too much for us to dig up, so I've had to work the garden round it, stupid people Sounds like the end of my garden too, DD. :  OB you know that I have the same problem as yours, but not on such a grand scale - but having a much smaller garden means that the rubble clutters up too much of an area and it's everywhere. A couple of days ago I dug up a rusty old double cooker socket.  I think what might have happened is that whoever lived here before sometime wanted to make a lawn/garden, and asked anyone around who had some rubbish to dispose of it in here as aggregate for this lawn/border. But DD I've also discovered walls, and an airraid shelter which are both well below the level of the rubble, and considering this was part of a farmhouse built in the 1780's I reckon the original level of the garden was several feet below what it is now. You are well entitled to have a good old moan about this OB. |
|
Had to explain a few things to him. Maybe he was a builder too!! 
they never find much it could make a change or them. 