The bird is the wiz at the electricals. Or, the bird wizzed on the electricals and burnt his feather. Idk, it's too early to tell.
Boarx diodes are pretty easy to make, aluminum, lead, and a saturated solution of sodium tetroborate will do that.
Boron is a known semiconductor and it's been looked at a lot lately and offers some promising ideas, but I don't remember hearing about borax bring used as a transistor back in the early days. It probably was, however, everyone and their brother invented some sort of semiconducting trans-resistance device but they weren't ever efficient enough to be worthwhile.
Bell Labs didn't invent the transistor, it was just the right time for that kind of device and theirs worked well enough to be that device.
I mean, sure. I've got a box of borax and the laundry room right now. I could do some stuff with it, like laundry or something.
If you want to be practical sure