Garden shredder advise Spring 2023

[JohnBishop]

Hi All,

  I have some of it to shred. I am going to compost it and leave the bigger bits for my fire stove.

 

Someone has put a video of a quiet shredder that was going through that kind of stuff pretty easily but I cannot find that video.

Best

[nod]

I’d hire one my wife’s just bought this x hire shredder The smaller ones soon block 

[Russell griffiths]

Anything electric will be awful. 

Petrol one like nod picture is about as small as you want to go. 

 

[saveasteading]

I've got an electric Bosch worm drive one that handles the mid sized sticks you are describing, and usefully drags the rest of a branch through behind it. 

No good on wet stuff.

I converted a pile of shrub of about 3m3 (mostly air obv) into firewood and bean poles plus  about 0.5m3 of mulch and 1 brown bin of messy ends.

 

Slow  though with one stick at a time. Allow 2 hours for your pile.

I have had it at least 10 years, and it still seems to be top in Gardeners World report.

 

Also have a borrowed one that is a spinning blade. Only good for big sticks and very noisy. Havent used it and giving it back.

[JohnBishop]

2 hours ago, saveasteading said:

I've got an electric Bosch worm drive one that handles the mid sized sticks you are describing, and usefully drags the rest of a branch through behind it. 

No good on wet stuff.

I converted a pile of shrub of about 3m3 (mostly air obv) into firewood and bean poles plus  about 0.5m3 of mulch and 1 brown bin of messy ends.

 

Slow  though with one stick at a time. Allow 2 hours for your pile.

I have had it at least 10 years, and it still seems to be top in Gardeners World report.

 

Also have a borrowed one that is a spinning blade. Only good for big sticks and very noisy. Havent used it and giving it back.

what is the model of this Bosch?

[JohnBishop]

5 hours ago, nod said:

I’d hire one my wife’s just bought this x hire shredder The smaller ones soon block 

this creates a dilemma for me because I would rather do it in stages than hire and do a whole lot, I mean a lot more but I would have to trim the hedge on the boundary first which would create 20+ piles like that.
On the other hand you are right the electric is slower and keeps blocking. I should go after the hedge and then shred it. In the meantime pile all the stuff in the right location so I don't have to keep moving stuff around.

I don't know how safe is the process of unblocking an electric one but I reckon if I have to do it like 100 times then the risk of losing a hand increases.

Edited April 3, 2023 by JohnBishop

[crispy_wafer]

I had a Camon C150 for 5 years or so, absolutely brutal that thing was, but very noisy, had two chutes, one for brush like material with flail like hammers, and one for upto 4" material that used blades to create chippings.  Fantastic for reducing a big pile of into something useful.  Relatively easy to use and self feeding for the most part, most problems occurred when either overloading, or with branches that split into Y shapes.  No need to go sticking a hand in, just use another branch to push the obstruction through,

[saveasteading]

1 hour ago, JohnBishop said:

model of this Bosch

I will look in the shed to see if it still has any markings.

Looks similar to this. I suspect the innards have not changed

 

 

[jack]

I've got the older version of this:

 

 

 

Not the fastest thing in the world, but if you have a lot of long thin (up to about 4.5 cm, I think) twiggy offcuts, this is very quiet and does a great job.

 

With a bit of care, I managed to process a massive pile of brambles a couple of years ago.

[saveasteading]

AXT 2000-HP.

It won't take sticks more than about 30mm, but those get lopped into kindling so it suits me. 

 

The big thing it does is, being a worm drive, it drags the stick through...you can walk away, and it takes the twig and leaf stuff with it. It just gets dragged in. That saves ages.

With too much wet stuff it can stall, so I keep some dry sticks aside which will always engage and take the bits with it.

[saveasteading]

1 hour ago, jack said:

process a massive pile of brambles 

Does that become thousands of potential growing nodes? I have them in the pile of mulch, hoping they will die off there, but fear they are lying in wait for when I put them on the flower beds.

 

Yesterday I found lots of bramble 'trunks' among the shrubs I thought I had cleared of them. They made the mistake of turning green while shooting up.  It is a constant war.

[SteamyTea]

9 hours ago, saveasteading said:

No good on wet stuff

That is interesting.

I had a large garden to sort out when I was living in Hertfordshire. The small electric shredder (from B&Q) worked a treat on newly cut stuff, hopeless on week old stuff that had been left in the sun.

[saveasteading]

@SteamyTea   @OnOff and others:    Will we be having a 'How does your garden grow' feature again?

[Onoff]

8 minutes ago, saveasteading said:

@SteamyTea   @OnOff and others:    Will we be having a 'How does your garden grow' feature again?

 

As and when I'll just add to the existing thread. 

[jack]

3 hours ago, saveasteading said:

Does that become thousands of potential growing nodes? I have them in the pile of mulch, hoping they will die off there, but fear they are lying in wait for when I put them on the flower beds.

 

No, I composted it well before using it (shredding massively helps with the composting process).

 

Even if you don't compost, you can just let it dry out properly during a long period of dry weather. It's tough, but it's still a plant, and it won't stand drying out completely for long without soil around it.

[saveasteading]

21 minutes ago, jack said:

but it's still a plant

It's all currently mixed in the mulch pile. Presumably any nodes not destroyed will try to grow then fail in the pile.

 

[JohnBishop]

I think I go for BOSCH AXT 25 TC.

I see someone in my area wants to sell it used.
There was ATX 2000 on offer but someone was ahead of me.

[JohnBishop]

What if I buy used ATX 2000 and ATX 2200?

Plug them to separate sockets then work on both at the same time.
Similar noise but twice the throughput.

By the way what do you do with the shredded stuff? Do you compost it or spread on the surface to create some weed barrier?

Edited April 10, 2023 by JohnBishop

[saveasteading]

31 minutes ago, JohnBishop said:

what do you do with the shredded stuff? 

Lay it on the surface to kill weed seedlings, and to keep the ground moist.

Any thickness helps but 50mm is often recommended.

If you dug it in , it would rot in the ground and reduce nutrients.

Or mix it in with compost for next year

Edited April 10, 2023 by saveasteading

[Sparrowhawk]

39 minutes ago, saveasteading said:

If you dug it in , it would rot in the ground and reduce nutrients.

Reduce or add nutrients? I always thought the latter hence the Q

[saveasteading]

1 hour ago, Sparrowhawk said:

Reduce or add nutrients?

I can't remember the science, but the act of it rotting takes one of N, P or K out of the soil around it.

But if it is in the compost, that happens benignly and it is all useable and useful  compost next year.

[saveasteading]

Nitrogen is lost.

 

This is good on the subject

 

https://www.rhs.org.uk/soil-composts-mulches/woody-waste-using-as-mulch

 

[SteamyTea]

35 minutes ago, saveasteading said:

Nitrogen is lost.

Can be replaced with wee wee.

[saveasteading]

16 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Can be replaced with wee wee.

Saves going indoors, but my compost heaps are right next to the pavement and road, and a bit high.

And once mulched round the roses, I'm not going that close.

Edited April 10, 2023 by saveasteading

[SteamyTea]

40 minutes ago, saveasteading said:

Saves going indoors, but my compost heaps are right next to the pavement and road, and a bit high.

And once mulched round the roses, I'm not going that close.

Just make sure your cheeks an are pointing into the wind. Will be just like primary school again.