"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
...

In article ,
"Angela" writes:
| I have just moved to a new house which has lots of trees . It is clear
I am
| going to need to invest in a garden vacuum/blower, but I have no idea
what
| to look for except I want an electric one.

Having seen a fair number of people use them (mostly in the line of
work), almost all blowers are less effective than a decent grass
rake.

While vacuums do work better, I doubt that the cheap ones are any
more effective than a rake, either.


The main advantage of a vacuum is that it also chops/shreds the leaves
making them better to compost. Having over 100 trees in the garden means I
am getting to be quite an expert at clearing leaves. I have discovered it
becomes an all year round job when you also have a large number of big
hollies. Yew needles are also a PITA as they are so easily trodden into the
house and are almost impossible to sweep from the tarmac. See;
http://share.ovi.com/media/Muddymike...e.10523?sort=5
For these reasons I use a Billy Goat vacuum. Its big, its noisy, it uses a
lot of petrol, and the bag is a pain to empty, but it sucks up everything in
its path. As soon as the rain stops for long enough I shall be using the
Billy Goat today.

Mike