Brush brooms have proven themselves for centuries. Whether for cleaning driveways, terraces and paths or as a utensil for little witches and magicians – a broom of the right size can be tied up yourself and there is plenty of material for this in the garden.
The principle of the broom is simple: depending on the desired thickness, it consists of two or three individual bundles that you tie together with wire under high tension and then press them together to form the actual broom and tie it with wire.
Binding requires strength that no one can muster by hand. A so-called wolf’s jaws used to be used for this – huge, brutal-looking round-nose pliers with a long handle. If you don’t have something like this, you can use lashing straps, like those used to secure loads.
You need this:
- lots of brushwood, 60 to 70 cm long. The brushwood should not be too wet, but should still be flexible, otherwise the broom will shrink and you will have to tighten the wire later. Suitable brushwood comes from birch, hazel, dogwood, broom or blueberries.
- Broomstick or a straight branch about three centimeters thick with the smoothest possible bark. Hazel shoots or twigs from young maple are particularly straight, but other trees and shrubs also work. The stem length depends on the fagot. The entire broom should be about 160 centimeters long; if it serves as a child’s toy, of course less. Subtract the length of the bundle of twigs from this, then you have the length of the stalk.
- Tension wire or fence wire, 2 to 2.5 mm thick. Bare wire is best, green coated wire is difficult to twist. If you only get 1.5 to 1.8 mm thick wire, just double it up. Thinner wire tears when twisted.
- Packing tape/string
- gloves
- secateurs
- sharp handsaw
- Spanngurt
- They didn’t ask him
- sturdy garden knife or light machete for debarking the handle
- cordless screwdriver
- 4 mm screw hook
1. twisting branches
Twist a handful of sticks of varying thickness into a small bunch. It doesn’t matter if the branches unroll a little afterwards.
2. tighten branch bundles
Gather two or three of the twisted branches into a bundle and pull them together as tightly as possible with a ratchet strap.
3. Secure bundle with wire
Now wrap wire around the bundle and twist it tight. Twist both ends of the wire into a loop so that no wire sticks out.
4. Merge and save bundles again
Now tie these two or three individual bundles together again with a tension belt and fix them again with wire. On smaller brooms in two places, on longer ones in three places. Form wire loops again and use the cordless screwdriver.
5. tweak branches
Now cut the bundle to a uniform length and give the broom its shape. You can use a pruning saw on one end and pruning shears on the other.
6. Sharpen the broomstick
Sharpen the broomstick branch with a machete or a sharp knife and remove the bark if you like. Then the broom is usually better in the hand.
7. Connect handle and broom head
Now you need some strength: ram the broom handle, point first, into the middle of the broom head by hitting it hard several times on a solid surface. Be sure to wear gloves!
Pruning the base of the stem
Now cut the base of the stem slightly at an angle. It just looks nicer and can be done with garden shears.
