Charging for green waste collection!!!!

[Jeanied]

Oh dear I hope this is not going to be a trend with councils. Ours have a big bag system - similar to the white bags that loose building materials are delivered in but smaller - and they are collected fortnightly during the spring all the way through to December. The waste is taken to a giant composting site in the area and turned into soil conditioner which they sell - not sure if it is privately owned or council run but I suspect the former. So we give them the material and they make the profit.

[Two_Sheds]

So we give them the material and they make the profit.

Yes but ... they provide the transport and labour ...

[bazzaboy]

I'm not trying to be a goody goody teacher's pet, just showing how it can be done differently.

You're very good at this 2S, gold star or whatever teachers dole out these days (local school gives "pips", so many pips make an "apple" and so many apples make a "tree" in the "orchard"! Very appropriate coz an old fruit growing area.....)

Some questions, see if you can win a pip, two even.....

Interested to have read what you do with with ivy (I've a lot of that) and bindweed (more than I want of that) (and couch grass?) - but what of an annual large heap of clippings from hawthorn (vicious stuff, hundreds of 3 inch needles as sharp as a hypodermic and really difficult to get through shredder) - is there a good use for them you can think of? I currently bin or burn, but incinerators rather frowned upon by neighbours....

Do you shred all cardboard including e.g. cereal boxes which are quite highly coloured?

And colour supplements? (I don't buy many these days but they still turn up...) GYO once key pages kept? business envelopes c/w "window"? advertising mail? catalogues - get loads of those....; tissues?

What's the brown/green ratio you aim at, roughly 50/50 by volume or weight?

Am now collecting tins for (occasional use of) the Hemenway slug deterrent.... but is there a purpose for used foil?

Paint pots with residues of emulsion, gloss etc - not supposed to go in collected waste.... (Take up painting...)

Old electric and electronic stuff... mobiles, computers, printers, go-faster gizzmos that never went anywhere.... lol, it's like Steptoe here

I'll stop, sufficient to the day....... Thanks for any suggestions!! bb.

[salome2001]

Old electric and electronic stuff... mobiles, computers, printers, go-faster gizzmos that never went anywhere.... lol, it's like Steptoe here
.

The councils I'm familiar with do small electric waste recycling: sometimes bins in the local supermarket, sometimes a booked collection from the council (we left out some burned out kettles, printers etc but I think they were half-inched before the council actually collected them!)

[bazzaboy]

I've never fancied putting my grass cuttings on the lottie though, my lawns full of dandelions so don't want them on the lottie as well.

CS, I went through a conversion regarding dandelions that I'll relate to you in the hope it helps to solve your distress! I have had a lifetime of fighting dandelions, firstly by digging them up - which is hopeless - secondly by poisoning them which is easy and 100% effective (see below). But before I relate that let me also recall the day I heard one of the famous gardeners on Desert Island Discs (can't remember who) chose to take dandelion seeds to the desert island! I couldn't believe it but he argued that they would be indestructible, easy to grow in abundance, brighten the place up, the root makes a substitute coffee, the milky fluid makes a mosquito repellant, you can eat them and make (“good”, he claimed) wine out of them..... So not all bad!

But to eradicate them if that is your wish you have to develop a mental attitude called "Dandelion Patrol"! You can make up your own poison with various iron related products (e.g. iron sulphates with sand etc which do the damage but I’m not sure what’s allowed these days over the chemist’s counter), much easier is a small packet of “Weed & Feed” from Wilkos which contains all the essentials. You go round the area to be cleared AT LEAST TWICE A DAY (coz on a sunny day they can virtually complete the flower and seed dispersal of 2000+ babes in a few hours!) and you pick any developing flowers or seed heads and put them in a bag so they don’t get dispersed and you add a pinch of the Feed and Weed to the centre of the remaining plant leaves. Don’t dig it up, don’t pick the leaves, don’t inject with vinegar or any of the other 101 “cures”, just leave it. But do do do repeat the routine regularly and at least twice on sunny days, cropping flowers, adding a pinch of Feed & Weed. The Feed and Weed doesn’t kill the dandelion but excites it so that it attempts to flower even faster and in so doing it exhausts itself… So the leaves will grow rapidly, so rapidly that they look distorted, then the whole thing collapses and is dead (including the root which might go down in your lawn a good 2 feet and any part still alive would regrow, thus the impossibility of digging them out). Just get into the Dandelion Patrol routine and in a few days you’ll see a big difference, in a few weeks there won’t be a dandelion anywhere in the area covered. I guarantee that works 100%! It’s then dead easy to maintain. And then you’ll feel happier using the grass cuttings on the allotment.....

[hamamelis]

Bristol charges, you have to sign up to it

Does it?

No-one told me!

We get free weekly little brown bin pick-ups, for kitchen/garden waste. I live right near the centre (st. Pauls), maybe it's different in other bits of town- I s'pose a lot of people don't have a garden here. I use it more than I should- as the lottie's quite a way away, and I keep forgetting to bring my bin down with me. It tends to have quite a lot of cooked stuff in anyway, 'cos my housemate's terrible at working out food portions...

I think BANES district charges, but not 'ere!

[zazen999]

To be honest, I wish they would start charging round here; as Mr Z insists on putting some things in it [on the QT, when I'm not looking] which I would happily compost. I might mock up a flyer and post it round our house later.

[Two_Sheds]

annual large heap of clippings from hawthorn (vicious stuff)

I inherited a big load of that ~ vicious indeed, and I won't be attempting to compost it again ~ still vicious after a year! Burn it on the chiminea

Do you shred all cardboard including e.g. cereal boxes which are quite highly coloured?

Yes, all cardboard. Colouring is vegetable based ink

And colour supplements?

All glossy mags, not vegetable based ink, so I don't compost them. They go to my GP surgery when I pick up my prescriptions

GYO once key pages kept?

GP surgery for others to read

business envelopes c/w "window"?

Window torn out, goes in black bin. Paper envelope is torn up and composted.

advertising mail? ...catalogues - get loads of those....;

I don't open them, just write "UNSOLICITED" on them and put back in post box. They eventually get the message and stop sending them.

tissues?

Compost

What's the brown/green ratio you aim at, roughly 50/50 by volume or weight?

Dunno, I don't measure. It works though

used foil?

Black bin. No value for recycling

Paint pots with residues of emulsion, gloss ...Old electric and electronic stuff...

If it's something I'll need in future, for touching up, I pour it into a smaller (jam) jar and label "living room" or "bathroom". The rest goes on Freecycle or eBay

I have had a lifetime of fighting dandelions

Me too. Back lawn riddled with them.

- pick off all flower heads as they appear
- dig up plant with a grubber, for the guinea pigs who love them
- fill hole left in lawn with grass seed

[bazzaboy]

I inherited a big load of that ~ vicious indeed, and I won't be attempting to compost it again ~ still vicious after a year! Burn it on the chiminea
Yes, all cardboard. Colouring is vegetable based ink
All glossy mags, not vegetable based ink, so I don't compost them. They go to my GP surgery when I pick up my prescriptions
GP surgery for others to read
Window torn out, goes in black bin. Paper envelope is torn up and composted.
I don't open them, just write "UNSOLICITED" on them and put back in post box. They eventually get the message and stop sending them.
Compost
Dunno, I don't measure. It works though
Black bin. No value for recycling
If it's something I'll need in future, for touching up, I pour it into a smaller (jam) jar and label "living room" or "bathroom". The rest goes on Freecycle or eBay
Me too. Back lawn riddled with them.
- pick off all flower heads as they appear
- dig up plant with a grubber, for the guinea pigs who love them
- fill hole left in lawn with grass seed

Thank you so much, an orchard for teacher no less! And one without dandelions!
I will renew my re-cycling efforts....

[Two_Sheds]

Can I go now? Mr TS is bugging me to get off this computer

[VirginVegGrower]

Tin foil - check your local church. Ours collects tin foil, which they turn into cash. You don't have to attend in order to get rid of stuff.

Paint cans/leftover paint - I used to do charity day painting and we always wanted folks' leftover paint. Check out local kids clubs, scout huts, drop in centres. They are not "patronised" as charity based organisations are.

Magazines - doctors surgery, dentists surgery. They get mine.

Electrical items - donate to friends or free cycle. Mobile phones can be sold for parts on eBay or put in a donation bag/box for some charities. Again they get cash. Old printers/cartridges ditto. IT companies sent them off for parts breaking. Or at least the one I worked for did - they manufacture printers amongst other things

I took my mother's veg peelings, all bagged in recycle bags, out of her bin yesterday. I'll have these for my bean trenches said I. I also took all of her shredded paper - I can make firelighter briquettes with those!!! I also took her newspapers - lining paper for my Eglu. Come on mother...

[Hilary B]

CS, I went through a conversion regarding dandelions that I'll relate to you in the hope it helps to solve your distress! I have had a lifetime of fighting dandelions, firstly by digging them up - which is hopeless - secondly by poisoning them which is easy and 100% effective (see below). But before I relate that let me also recall the day I heard one of the famous gardeners on Desert Island Discs (can't remember who) chose to take dandelion seeds to the desert island! I couldn't believe it but he argued that they would be indestructible, easy to grow in abundance, brighten the place up, the root makes a substitute coffee, the milky fluid makes a mosquito repellant, you can eat them and make (“good”, he claimed) wine out of them..... So not all bad!

.

Dandelion wine is one of my favourites, and yes, they are probably the most fully useful plant on the planet. Leaves can be used as salad (when young) or cooked like spinach, roots can be dried for a drinkable alternative to coffee (just don't expect it to taste like coffee) or boiled as a root veg, flowers go into wine (but you do need other ingredients). They are also very popular with grass-eating animals (because that deep root picks up loads of essential trace elements), so if on your desert island you have a goodly patch growing, rabbits, goats and other edible beasties will be available!

[Currysniffa]

CS, I went through a conversion regarding dandelions that I'll relate to you in the hope it helps to solve your distress! I have had a lifetime of fighting dandelions, firstly by digging them up - which is hopeless - secondly by poisoning them which is easy and 100% effective (see below). But before I relate that let me also recall the day I heard one of the famous gardeners on Desert Island Discs (can't remember who) chose to take dandelion seeds to the desert island! I couldn't believe it but he argued that they would be indestructible, easy to grow in abundance, brighten the place up, the root makes a substitute coffee, the milky fluid makes a mosquito repellant, you can eat them and make (“good”, he claimed) wine out of them..... So not all bad!

But to eradicate them if that is your wish you have to develop a mental attitude called "Dandelion Patrol"! You can make up your own poison with various iron related products (e.g. iron sulphates with sand etc which do the damage but I’m not sure what’s allowed these days over the chemist’s counter), much easier is a small packet of “Weed & Feed” from Wilkos which contains all the essentials. You go round the area to be cleared AT LEAST TWICE A DAY (coz on a sunny day they can virtually complete the flower and seed dispersal of 2000+ babes in a few hours!) and you pick any developing flowers or seed heads and put them in a bag so they don’t get dispersed and you add a pinch of the Feed and Weed to the centre of the remaining plant leaves. Don’t dig it up, don’t pick the leaves, don’t inject with vinegar or any of the other 101 “cures”, just leave it. But do do do repeat the routine regularly and at least twice on sunny days, cropping flowers, adding a pinch of Feed & Weed. The Feed and Weed doesn’t kill the dandelion but excites it so that it attempts to flower even faster and in so doing it exhausts itself… So the leaves will grow rapidly, so rapidly that they look distorted, then the whole thing collapses and is dead (including the root which might go down in your lawn a good 2 feet and any part still alive would regrow, thus the impossibility of digging them out). Just get into the Dandelion Patrol routine and in a few days you’ll see a big difference, in a few weeks there won’t be a dandelion anywhere in the area covered. I guarantee that works 100%! It’s then dead easy to maintain. And then you’ll feel happier using the grass cuttings on the allotment.....

Thank you bb will give it a try this spring/summer. I have use feed and weed before and it worked but I guess I didn't keep the "Dandelion Patrol" going long enough and there back.

I don't care to eat them or anything like that tbh.

[bazzaboy]

. I have used feed and weed before and it worked but I guess I didn't keep the "Dandelion Patrol" going long enough.

Yes, don't bother casting F&W generally, just concentrate a small pinch right on top of that tap root. If you call it "Dandelion Patrol", even say out loud "It's time for Dandelion Patrol!" it helps you to remember to do it and becomes a bit of a joke (which helps, even if the dandelions don't see the funny side! Good luck with it.

[salome2001]

Does it?

No-one told me!

We get free weekly little brown bin pick-ups, for kitchen/garden waste. I live right near the centre (st. Pauls), maybe it's different in other bits of town- I s'pose a lot of people don't have a garden here. I use it more than I should- as the lottie's quite a way away, and I keep forgetting to bring my bin down with me. It tends to have quite a lot of cooked stuff in anyway, 'cos my housemate's terrible at working out food portions...

I think BANES district charges, but not 'ere!

From the bristol city council website:

"Your garden waste
Garden (and kitchen) waste are the worst types of material to go in the rubbish bin. They produce large amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas, as they break down in landfills. This scheme is designed to keep material like this out of landfills.

Collection of garden waste is an optional service. You can either have a garden waste bin, or use garden waste sacks.

There is a charge for this service.

You can purchase a 240 litre garden waste bin and sign up for a year of weekly garden waste collections for a total of £53 (£21 for your bin and £32 for your collection service a year).

For £1 you can buy a 75 litre garden waste sack. This price includes delivery and collection from the kerbside.

New recycling service - you will now need to phone our customer services centre each time you want to book a collection, so we know where there are sacks that need picking up."



The brown bins are for food waste, not garden waste