I have a small compost heap that should be a LARGE compost heap, but I have a problem: we have TONS of vines and small bushes. Honeysuckle, jasmine, grapes, camellia, tomatoes, rhododendrons, etc.

Normally, I run the smaller ones over with a lawn mower, but that's not very efficient... plus it gets fouled with many of the larger ones.

I have an electric 'chipper' that works -fine- for woody things but is -useless- for anything flexible... which is 90% of what we have.

SO: Is there any relatively inexpensive machine you can recommend which will reliably grind/chop the above plant material. If we could find one, we'd never have to purchase compost -again-.

TIA,

--JC

Lloyd

I use my mower to shred this type of material but I can see your point that if you have alot of it, a mower is not ideal. I think I would create a separate compost pile for them and just wait, even if it takes a couple years. I put whole bean stalks into my compost pile and they eventually disappear. Running over the pile with the tiller occasionally seems to speed things up.

I think if I could get them chopped into -smaller- sections (like 12" or less) -then- hit them with a lawnmower, I'd be in good shape.

Any thoughts on this? Recommendations for machete?

I pack them into the center of a remesh compost cylinder as tight as I can, water them well, and dump lawn clippings on them, or feces-free cat litter (basically urine-soaked sawdust).

The outer rim of the cylinder has leaves and easily composted stuff piled up, vines drop into the center cavity.

Then I pound it down with a rake to get the fine stuff to drift down into the voids of the vines. and water it periodically. And keep piling things into the cylinder, like kitchen waste. Until it's full, then I let it sit, watering periodically, until I need compost.

Check out the "the richsoil link" or google for more info. It's not necessary to dig a hole but one can make a raised bed using this method. That's what I plan to do.

That Sepp Holzer sounds interesting. A bit extreme for a guy like me with a small suburban yard, but it's definitely got some good ideas.

Thanks all!

---JC

I took lopers and chopped them down to about 1 foot sections while they were green and left them on the drive way to dry out and then ran 'em over with the mower.

Sometimes I just threw the 1 ft sections into the long term no turn bins similar to lazygardens. Those bins were dedicated to stuff I didn't want to turn and were on 18 month to 2 year cycles.

The best implement I saw for fibrous stuff was an old silage thing I saw at a farm fair. It had a long shallow slough ramped down to a chopping blade. I think it was used for corn stalks.

I know the tree guys out here have to use a particular kind of chipper for palm fronds. Those things are fibrous too. I only had a couple of pygmy palms to deal with so it was no big deal to chop the stalks, let dry and then mow.

to sense
..