Pallet boards

[the funny farm6]

We just found a pallet company not too far from us where we can get pallets loaded with their scrap. The one we got today was loaded about 4 ft high with boards that are half inch by 4 inch wide. 2-3 foot long. I am going to use a lot of them for building rabbit and chicken pens. But could use ideas for other uses for them. We can also get 2x4 about the same length. No nails so we can use the scrap for kindling.

 

[the funny farm6]

 

[milkmansdaughter]

anytime i can get free wood i'll take it, but i much prefer wood without nails or screws in it.

i'm in the middle of a large project here right now where i have about 50 pallets that have rotted that i'll have to get rid of and not by burning. it took me about a month to just get them taken out of where they were at and stacked more out of the way. a lot were so rusted out and rotting i could remove the nails by pulling them with my fingers or even scraping them up with the trowel and removing them and putting them in the jug for recycling.

i'm not sure yet what i'll be doing with the pallets that haven't rotted all the way yet, but it is going to take a lot of time to deal with them. i don't want to risk stepping on rusty nails so burying them isn't what i'd want to do, but i may be forced to use them as fill anyways. luckily if i do end up having to do that it won't be in any place that will be gardened or disturbed much, but i'm hoping to avoid that if i can. i want the wood if i can cut along the edges and get the decent wood that can be used in places until it rots. then i would only have the ribs of the pallets with all the nails left to deal with.

i don't want to burn it. too bad i can't get a big tub and throw them all in there and then worm compost them until i can go back through and get the nails out. i'd do that in a big pile just on the ground someplace but Mom will have something to say about that... hmm, gotta keep thinking about this...

Just curious, but why don't you want to burn them? I burn wood like that and then use a large magnet to pick up all the nails. Then the ashes can be put in the compost bin, garden, or chicken dusting area.
Could you start a compost pile with them? That wood is already decaying and could create lots of air pockets. Later, you could sift the nails out.
The idea about using them for worms is a good idea too. Maybe you can find an out of the way area where you can start a good worm bed, and use it for adding worms when you are planting.
I'm not sure how you feel about wildlife, but a pile of those on the edge of the property could be left for a natural habitat area for rabbits, small animals, birds and bees. And as they rot, you'd have the worms.

 

[milkmansdaughter]

I have a pallet fence around my zucchini and potatoes to keep my free ranging chickens out. And a second pallet fence to close off an area where I keep new animals in quarantine until I add them to the rest.
I tacked a pallet to the wall, and use it to hold all of my shovels, rakes, and long handled tools corralled neatly.

 

[Beekissed]

So you've decided to get sheep again? Seems you have been thinking about it but, undecided. Nice. Sheep are nice.

Yes! If the Lord wills it and I can find the right stock, I'll be getting three lambs this Aug. Two ewes and a ram. I'm looking at two different sources right now and need to go look at the second one this next week, if I can.

Sheep are lovely, sweet and my favorite livestock to raise. Can't wait!!! They are part of my long term plan to decrease the mowing around here~we mow around 4 acres right now and gas ain't getting any cheaper, nor is mower repair~ and also produce more healthy meat than I can produce with my chicken flock.

 

[flowerbug]

my preference would be to compost them. burning is a last resort because we are both very sensitive to wood smoke (we do have a fireplace but it is converted to burning propane). if i do go that route i will dig a pretty deep trench in the clay and then try to make as much biochar/charcoal out of them that i can. i've done this once before and really liked the results and the effects upon the clay, but it really was hard on my lungs. i will need a burn permit. then the ashes and char would be contained in one pit and i would be able to sift that smaller area to get the remaining nails out.

none of the pallets appear to be pressure treated wood. cutting up with a circular saw is one way i may go to salvage whatever wood i can reuse as mulch or coverage for areas around fences and such. we have a lot of that type of edge in places so i've already got that kind of thing going on. the friend who burns wood and splits a lot of wood used to bring us his chunks of bark and any rotting pieces of wood he can't burn, but he's injured now and not doing much wood making so that hasn't happened for a few seasons. still i would take all wood debris he would bring along with his fireplace ashes. i can always find places to use those (but not fast enough to make Mom happy lol).

we are rural, site maps, descriptions, tons of pictures at www.anthive.com which will give a lot more context for my comments.

as i noted, i will take any wood that is free and use it all around the gardens or yard in various ways. as it breaks down it is habitat for many creatures and it gives the raccoons, skunks, possums, etc places to hunt for food. when it is broken down it becomes humus for gardens or is just left in place. we use wood chips in a lot of perennial gardens and around trees and eventually i scrounge up the partially or fully decayed wood chip remains and use them as part of the buckets when i restart the worm farm each spring (after taking 80-90% of them to the gardens to be used as my fertlizer for the heavier feeding veggies). it's a nice system other than moving the buckets is heavy, but i only have to do that once a year. when i bring the buckets back in from the gardens they are partially full of garden soil to be recharged by the worms (a variation upon what most people do with worm composting, but i also use a mix of worm species including native worms so that i am encouraging about 4 species of natives along with the european/belgian night-crawlers which do not survive in our climate.)

i try to keep all the rotting wood at least 50ft from the house to discourage the foraging carpenter ants from thinking the house should be their next home... i do have to use some borax/sugar solutions at times to get rid of ant nests closer to the house for that reason too. i also caulk up any cracks i can find around the perimeter of the house because it helps keep the bugs out. always stuff to do for sure...

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

Pallets are the best. On a small scale, they're great for crafts! Larger scale? The possibilities are endless! They're great for firewood, nest boxes, raised beds as sumi said- you name it

Made a dog house out of it, My dog loves it. I painted it red and black. and since there's a lot of wood. I made it bigger than usual so he won't be cramped inside...

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

we ma

What a score! I love working with pallets, the wood is light and easy enough for me to manoeuvre alone.



This was my plan when I moved here, but so far I have only been able to get my hands on 2 So one is being used as low garden edging as I build the soil up, and the other might be for this idea-



What a great one, thanks for that

How can you tell if they are treated? I don't think the ones I have are, they are natural colour/smell and splintery.

we made a hanging cabinet using pallets. its a great addition in my kitchen. and its very easy to clean and paint. I love our new cabinet.

 

[milkmansdaughter]

Woohoo! What a jackpot! @Beekissed built a really cute playhouse with pallets, and I built a fence to keep chickens out of my new flower garden. Those were built with pallets, but I'd think you could easily build a 2x4 frame, and just use the wood. That would be great wood for building a swing. And I used 1/2 a pallet nailed to a wall to keep shovels and hoes corralled neatly in one spot. And I could think of a lot of crafty stuff to do with kids if I had that kind of wood.

 

[HomesteaderWife]

Pallets are the best. On a small scale, they're great for crafts! Larger scale? The possibilities are endless! They're great for firewood, nest boxes, raised beds as sumi said- you name it