DIY Tips Repurposing Scrap Wood In The Garden
It doesn’t take much looking to find an abundant stock of scrap wood to use in a number of settings. Start your list with this usable material, from shipping boxes and pallets to construction waste and old fences.
Check first to ensure reclaimed wood is safe to use
Here are links to some sites for finding out whether or not your reclaimed wood has been treated with chemicals.
Three reclaimed wood projects
Let’s start by seeing some of these reclaimed wood materials after they have made useful items and placed in or by the garden.
We begin with MisterSoul99, an accomplished woodworker who had a lot of scrap cedar he’d collected from a job site.
“I didn’t want to throw them away,” he says.
Instead, he decided to create an eye-catching planter box.
Tools needed:
- Woodworking tools (tablesaw, circular saw, drill, etc.)
- Hammer (and an anvil if you have one)
- Tape measure
- Pliers
- Square
- Level
- Pry bar
- Eye and ear protection
Raised garden beds
Then there was depotdevoid, a person who found a half-collapsed fence in the back yard of the house he hd just bought.
“There were lots of old rusty nails sticking out all over the place in a spot right next to my daughter’s playground,” he writes, “so I decided I’d better do something about that. Without a truck readily available, I decided I’d just remove all the nails from the lumber and make a pile of it somewhere until I had an opportunity to take it down to the wood recycling place.”
Instead, he decided to create practical raised garden beds. “I settled on structures for my garden, and this instructable was born!”
This is a great gardening option — especially practical where bad soil or weed patches exist.
There are literally hundreds of options you can find for using reclaimed wood. The quickest and simplest is Chad Schimmel’s 3minute garden planter box.
Notice Schimmel uses a power nailer, a tool that makes this project even easier. However, power nailers, along with the required compressors and hoses, are expensive tools and most people won’t have the on hand.
If you have a a power drill or impact driver, I think a more durable option, due to shrinking and expansion from water and sun exposure, is to use deck screws, ones that won’t rust.
In the meantime, put on your creative thinking cap! You will be surprised at the reclaimed wood you can put to use in the garden, from signage to fences, planter boxes, and dividers.
Just make certain the wood you choose hasn’t been doused with harmful chemicals and get immersed in your next green project.
Image: Scraps of wood via Shutterstock