I’d like to say something I’ve been meaning to report for a long time and which sort of fits in here. Quite a few people here used to use toilet bowl wax rings (just pulling a finger full of wax off the ring) and I did it myself for a few years. But I have come to feel strongly that it is a mistake to use that- even though I know some of you do so. Perhaps there are different formulations of those wax rings which is why some of you have had good luck, but here is what I find:
If I smear that toilet bowl wax all over my scion wood to prevent it from drying out, it slowly destroys the bark on the scion. It makes it sort of dissolve- it just sort of turns the bark to mush and destroys it. If you put it really thin I’ve seen it work- mostly because it dries up and/or washes off before damaging the bark. But if put on realatively thick, it absolutely destroys the bark over the next 2 months or so. It acts like it has petroleum in it and I suspect it does, though I guess it also could just be that it totally prevents drying and evaporation to the point that it simply rots the bark. I’m not sure why it ruins it, but I’ve seen it over and over again and am sure that in many cases it DOES ruin the bark on the scion.
Anyway, its my experience that toilet bowl was ring wax should NOT be used, even though I know others seem to use it without issues. I can only say what I’ve seen and I’ve seen it a LOT. Just my experience.
BTW…I also tried that spray-on plastic coating stuff like “plasti-dip” and it does the same thing only faster and more dramatically, and with it you can SMELL the petroleum so I’m pretty sure that is why it doesn’t work- and it doesn’t.