Sorry

I stand corrected

19th Century Historical Tidbits: Turpentine Making

 

I agree with you, Louise. Leylandii is no problem at all when it is owned by a good gardener who understands the importance of trimming his hedge regularly. The difficulty, as you say, is that many people haven't got a clue and either leave established trees to go wild or plant them without realising what they're taking on.

A while ago some friends watched in horror as their neighbours planted out a row of Leylandii saplings and then lost interest in their garden completely as their time became taken up with domestic rows. Would the neighbours have the sense to maintain the hedge as it grew, or would they just let it go berserk, thus blocking out all the light from their small garden? Should they tackle the issue head on, or sneak over the fence when the neighbours were away and sort things out with the hedge clippers? Watching the hedge grow was a bit like watching a collection of cute baby crocodiles maturing into man-eaters. Eventually, they cured the problem by moving.

People get chippy when the neighbours complain about their house or garden; it seems so very personal. In the case of Leylandii, their response often seems to be: 'b****r the lot of you, they're my trees and I'm going to let those beauties rip!' Not even the most skillful tree surgeon can put things right once the trees have got beyond a certain point, because they won't regenerate from old wood. You get left with ugly stumps, which may not block out the light but aren't exactly things of beauty either.

 

thanks for that link Ziggy, enjoyed reading it.

from a modern day perspective turpentine oil production is a whole different ball game.

firstly it is a by-product from the paper industry; when the wood pulp slurry is pressed into paper the crude "venetian" turpentine separates to the surface on the water. (usually a pale gold yellow oil) this is then taken and dry distilled under vacuum, the distillate being turpentine oil and the residue being rosin (sometimes known as colophony) a gold to amber glass like resin.

secondly, nowadays, we only see turpentine substitute for DIY purposes (which is a derived fraction of fossil fuel oil) because the turpentine oil itself has much more value in other industries, predominantly in perfumes.

the major component of turpentine oil is alpha-pinene which can be isomerised into beta-pinene, both of which are used in thier own right in perfumery, but, more importantly are the down-stream products from them such as ionones, longifolenes, terpineols, linalool, geraniol. nerol, citronellol, citral... the list is enormous and new derivatives are created each year. they all end up in our chanel no5s, washing up liquids, air fresheners et al.