"Janet Baraclough.." wrote in message
...
The message m
from "kenty ;-\)" contains these words:

I have quite a large lawn,too much clippings to keep composting! Would
like
to know what others do with there clippings.

I've just come in from collecting the clippings from two neighbours'
gardens, who have their grass cut by a contractor. 8 high barrow-loads.
You can never have too much/many grass clippings.

Today's haul went straight on the beds as mulch, on top of earlier
spring mulch layers of seaweed and strawy manure. These beds were made
last year by laying cardboard on the lawn, and covering with clippings
etc; they are rich soft soil now, full of earthworms.

My own lawn's clippings from a cut on Sunday, were very mossy so I put
them in the compost heap along with a load of weeds and some seaweed.

Janet,

"You can never have too much/many grass clippings."

Mr Picky says 'yes you can have too much/many'.

With all due respect
There seems to be an assumption in some quarters that all contributors to
this NG have massive borders for growing stuff in, which are always crying
out for extra mulch, manure, feeding etc. which cannot be supplied from the
huge compost heaps constantly digesting plant material.
Witness the comments about bringing in neighbours grass clippings.
[BTW shouldn't these neighbours be composting their grass cuttings and
mulching their own borders?]
Not all gardens have a large border+compost heap to lawn ratio.
Perhaps you should merely state "In my particular garden, I can't get enough
grass clippings".
/With all due respect

For low maintenance it is good to have a large lawn (requires mowing but not
much else) and shrub borders which require occasional pruning and not much
else.
In the past I have converted borders to lawn because I didn't have the time
to weed them and the garden looked a mess.
Now I have more time, but I have not reached the stage of ripping up the
lawn to enlarge the beds.
[Although the fruit trees could be in for a limited treat this year.]
At the moment I am mainly growing fruit and vegetables in containers on our
very large very low maintenance patio area.
Grass as a mulch takes a long time to break down - a mowing will normally
last most of a year.
One mowing of my lawn will cover one of the two borders where I can hide the
mowings under the shrubbery. So in two to three weeks I have covered all
available space in the borders, and if I keep adding more layers it gets
unsightly and does not break down well - going to 'green slime' mode.
As stated elsewhere one mowing can fill a brown wheelie bin, which is
emptied once every two weeks, so in the spring and early summer the mowings
are being produced faster than the council can take them away.
I have just installed my trial 'builders bag' compost heap in one corner
where it will be mainly concealed by shrubs (a white bag is not a pretty
feature) and this is already 1/3 to 1/2 full. It is not going to swallow all
my clippings plus other material and compost it all down faster than I can
produce new clippings.
I expect it to be full within 6-8 weeks.
We shall see :-)
So if your garden is reasonably large, and you don't have the time (or the
gardener) to maintain large borders, and you don't have the desire (or the
money) for large scale 'hard landscaping' then you may well end up with a
garden which is mostly lawn, and which can produce mowings faster than the
borders can consume them.
Disposing of them in a constructive manner (not just in bin bags to create
methane in a landfill) is a serious problem.
Small gardens which are all lawn and no borders have even more of a problem,
but at least the brown bin can normally keep pace.

Cheers
Dave R