The article I remember seeing suggested baking the anise seeds. This would tend to drive off some of the oils in the seeds, reducing the smell when they are on the layout. I image it would tend to stink up the house during the baking process. I bought some anise seeds some time ago, and I plan on baking them in a couple of weeks when my wife is away on a trip. I should be able to get the house aired out before she gets back. Probably just leaving them out, exposed to the air for a long time (weeks or months) would also tend to have the smell slowly dissipate.

I'll have to dig out the article when I get home. Or was it a post on this list?


Richard Townsend
Lincoln City, Oregon

I used ordinary anise seed, not baked. Just glued on top of a carved foam
core. Also a bit of green foam to indicate the stalks that sometimes fall
in with the beets.



The anise seed will smell like licorice for a while. It was only noticeable
(to me) close up to the car (I don't have great sense of smell), but I
happen to like the smell. It certainly didn't stink up the layout room, and
went away after a few weeks.



I have had some of the Detail Assoc. cars in service on my layout now for at
least 15 years. Occasionally some of the anise will fall off the foam if I
invert the car for maintenance. I just glue a bit more in. Otherwise, no
problems.



I believe Chooch or someone now makes a molded sugar beet load for the Red
Caboose cars.



Rick



From: STMFC@... [mailto:STMFC@...] On Behalf Of
richtownsend@...
Sent: Wednesday, December 22, 2010 12:39 PM
To: STMFC@...
Subject: Re: [STMFC] Sugar beet loads






The article I remember seeing suggested baking the anise seeds. This would
tend to drive off some of the oils in the seeds, reducing the smell when
they are on the layout. I image it would tend to stink up the house during
the baking process. I bought some anise seeds some time ago, and I plan on
baking them in a couple of weeks when my wife is away on a trip. I should be
able to get the house aired out before she gets back. Probably just leaving
them out, exposed to the air for a long time (weeks or months) would also
tend to have the smell slowly dissipate.

I'll have to dig out the article when I get home. Or was it a post on this
list?

Richard Townsend
Lincoln City, Oregon

--- In STMFC@..., "Richard Stern" <rstern1@...> wrote:

I used ordinary anise seed, not baked. Just glued on top of a carved foam
core.

I use a mixture of anise seeds and bulgar wheat. The seed-wheat mix is then mixed with some beet-colored weathering powder.

Jim Lancaster

These loads are starting to sound delicious! Seriously, don't you
get problems with mice?? At my old train club we used to find so many
mouse droppings on the layout that I gathered them up and made loads
for the model manure spreader on the model farm... Also we found that
if we used natural material for trees, we had to make sure there were
no seed pods or buds or the mice would eat the scenery!

Tim O'Connor

Tim O'Connor wrote:

These loads are starting to sound delicious! Seriously, don't you get problems with mice??

Certainly a very real problem for some. I had mice eat the papier- mache parts of my scenery on one layout section when it was stored awhile in Bob Church's barn.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history

--- In STMFC@..., Tim O'Connor <timboconnor@...> wrote:

These loads are starting to sound delicious! Seriously, don't you
get problems with mice?? At my old train club we used to find so many
mouse droppings on the layout that I gathered them up and made loads
for the model manure spreader on the model farm... Also we found that
if we used natural material for trees, we had to make sure there were
no seed pods or buds or the mice would eat the scenery!

Tim O'Connor

I use a mixture of anise seeds and bulgar wheat. The seed-wheat mix is then mixed with some beet-colored weathering powder.

Jim Lancaster

So far I've had no problems with mice.

Jim

you must have a cat :-)