Before I elaborate, I must say that, in my experience here in the Winterberg, poplar wood used in the construction of sheds and shelter and is thus under cover, seems to be borer and bug free. Also my pile of poplar fire wood seems to be borer free, as opposed to my pile of thorn wood, which disintegrates before my eyes, Nevertheless, it is important to treat the logs against fungus and potential bugs. We sought a product that was non-toxic and environment friendly.
We were advised to paint the newly debarked and wet logs with a Borax solution which has a toxicity level of cooking salt, I am told. This consisted of boiling a solution of Propylene Glycol with Boric Acid and Borax Decahydrate to 130 degrees. Once this solution cooled down we would then dilute it with water in a ratio of 1:1. The water causes the Borax solution to crystalise. It was thus imperative to immediately paint the log with this diluted solution, so that it could penetrate the wood and then crystalise in the timber itself, thus making it impenetrable for bugs.
Also we painted the two ends of each log with a bitumen paint in order to minimise and slow down the cracking at the ends of the logs.
Once we finished all the debarking we numbered each log. This enabled us to catalogue the logs and rank them in order of quality, length and diameter. This would then help us with the exact selection of each log for the build. We want to predetermine which log is placed where.
