Sealing Paste.

[mudlarkpottery]

Does anyone have a recipe for sealing paste they would like to share? I had one years ago but lost it. I do remember that it had beeswax and linseed oil and it was like putty not the sticky Japanese type.
Penny.

[Levuccio]

Hey mate, thats what I found

Mix equal amounts of candle wax and vegetable oil together.
Melt it in an old saucepan inside a container sitting on boiling water. Take the container out of the saucepan when it is melted and leave it to cool until its like slippery gloop when you stir it. Add some ground cinnamon as a fungicide and colouring. Then get a whisk and whisk it for a few minutes until it is fluffy like chocolate mousse and not warm when you touch it. You can put it in a jar and use it when you need to. Dip your fingers in water before you use it because it is a bit sticky.

Source: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/loa ... 91.html?21

Hope this helps

[Jamie]

hi penny

a quick easy and cheap way of making a sealing paste/putty is to go down the $2 shop and get some plastecine you should be able to get an array of wonderful colours that you can mix to match the colour of the bark. all you need to do is mix a little vegetable oil with the plastecine and work it in some, it can get a little stick if to much oil is used but then it is more like a paste, less oil more like a putty. easy cheap and reliable, I used to do that when I first started sealing and I still knick some of the kids plastecine to use over the kiyonal a good bloke sent to me

jamie

[BirchMan]

On a related note do you need to scrape off dry sealing paste before the tree will heal over it?

[MelaQuin]

The tree should heal under the paste but if the wound is large it is not a bad idea after a few months to remove the sealant, irritate the developing callous around the base of it and reseal. This will encourage it to develop faster.

Grant Bowie in Canberra is finding success with sealing wounds with the goop thinly applied at the time of the cut and then the next day applying a layer of the putty sealant. His test trees and control trees show that the test trees are healing far more rapidly with the double sealant. Even figs he treats this way. Good thing to try particularly if you have a major wound at the front of the tree.

[Ray M]

Hi Penny,
MelaQuin mentioned that Grant is using both the liquid sealer and the paste. I have been running some experiments with this method and I too am finding that I get quicker healing.

Regards Ray

[mudlarkpottery]

Thanks for your responses. I will get some plasticene next time I go shopping.
Penny.

[Jamie]

no probs mate

as it has been mentioned if you have the kiyonal paste put that on first, let it dry for a day or so then use the plastecine putty, if you cant get the colour matching the bark what you can do is get some bark of a normal size tree that has the same sort of bark and press it onto the putty it will hold and look somewhat better than an odd colour.

the other thing I forgot to mention is that when I used it on a fig, I only had a bit of black plastencine, I mixed it with a touch to much oil and the black plastecine actually stained the oil which in turn stained the trunk, so if you can work the oil in well, then let it be for a little bit that should stop it from staining, even if you roll the plastecine on an old rag or similar to get the excess oil off will work too

jamie

[Taffy]

I use plasticine as well. I use it on stuff I have in black plastics and styrene boxes. The trees I have in Bonsai pots get the 'real' stuff. I get the cards with 10 colours from the $2.00 shop then mix them all together. If you knead it long enough it comes out a very similar grey colour to Cut Paste. I don't bother adding oil to it, I've found if you work it between your fingers for a few seconds, it softens enough to use as-is and a wet finger smooths the edges off quite nicely.

I've also read that if you mix a very small amount of Vegemite with the plasticine, it pretty well replicates the real thing because of the plant steroids, hormones etc in it. I haven't tried it myself, but I think it might be worth a try.