On Feb 22, 6:16*am, Brooklyn1 Gravesend1 wrote:
Higgs Boson wrote:
Brooklyn1 wrote:
Dan Espen wrote:
Higgs Boson writes:

Now the City has announced that food waste may be added to the yard
waste bins. *Result should be will be that their next quarterly free
distribution of
(lovely, fine-textured compost) will be even richer because of the
food waste.

So I have dismantled the bin and saved the little that looks something
like compost. *I'll clean it out, put on Craigs List, see who bites.

Looking back over this and the previous composter, I probably should
have just made a pile at the back of the garden and turned
periodically w/pitchfork.

Anybody else think their municipality would set up such a program?

Ours collects branches twice a year but only collects yard waste
that has been placed in large paper bags that you must purchase.

How I'm supposed to fill about 40 of these large bags per year
is a mystery. *I'd need some kind of mulcher and a lot of time.

Most of my neighbors use yard services.

I just create a big pile and late in August run it through a
framed screen. *It ends up on the lawn or in a flower bed.
(Where I found the leaves in the first place.)

I mostly compost household waste in my composter. *Most of my yard
waste gets dumped in the woods. *I don't have grass clippings because
I use mulching blades.

Mmmm....maybe I should ask the gardener to do the same -- if he *has*
mulching blades. *I can see that in the "winter" because grass doesn't
grow quite as fast, but in the summer? *Wouldn't it create a thick
blanket of mulched grass? *Remember, this is a mild "Mediterranean"
climate.

I mow ten acres of lawn, no way can I collect the clippings. *Mulching
blades chop grass blades into such tiny bits that on the first cut
parts they shrivel and disappear before I finish the last parts. *By
the time I clean up and have the mowers put away there are no
clippings to be seen. *I don't bother raking leaves, I mow them and
let the wind sweep them away. *Downed trees, branches, and prunings
get piled in the woods for critter homes. *My composter is for
household vegetation and for whatever comes from my veggie garden. *I
don't have a gardner, I'm it. *If you have a gardener doing your
mowing he should be using mulching blades or sucking up the clippings
and taking them away,

Sounds like you live in a really kewl rural area - woods! Wow!

As I said earlier, gardener had been putting grass clippings in the
composter until I stopped him doing it every week, but by then, it was
bulging.

if not then you don't need a gardner. *If after your gardner leaves
you have to rake up debris then you are being
ripped off.

No, I don't have to rake up debris. Gardener sweeps and blows.
Blowing is considered a capital offense by the City, so he has to be
very careful and blow at low revs in order not to get busted. There
are nuisance gardeners who blow loud and long, but he is not that
kind.

*People who end up with lots of clippings on their lawn it's because
they mow at too great a speed. *You really ought to consider mowing
your own lawn.

Actually, I have considered it from time to time. if I did, it would
be with an old push mower, as I don't have anywhere near 10 acres;
just a front & back lawn.
Part of the back is consumed by the veggie garden.

I keep the gardener because on alternate weekends he does a heavy job
that I don't have time, ability, or patience to do. All of his work
is class A.

Friday I will ask him about the mulching blade.


HB