It was finally a good day to start taking care of leaves. Nice temperature (around 60F) and not much wind. Jenna helped me load and pull the first tarp down. I tried to get the chipper/shredder started. Jenna tried and Jeff tried. It would turn over but not start. So I went to Tractor Supply and got some priming spray and a new spark plug. I haven't started the chipper/shredder in a long time, so I am not surprised that it needed something to get going. Jeff finally got it to turn over.
When I bought the chipper/shredder, I got it used. It is a Murray, a company that went bankrupt or sold out. I believe Troy Bilt bought them, but I'm not positive. Like many companies that build quality products that go out of business, I feel a bit sad for them (probably an overstated emotion, no tears were actually shed). They may something really good. It has a great design with the pull down hopper that allows you to scoot leaves in from the ground level. Many other chipper/shredders I looked at didn't have that feature. But, of course, there are not going to be any replacement parts when something customized for the machine breaks. I enjoy it and feel lucky to have found a used one that was in very good condition.
Jeff and Jenna brought me two more tarpfuls of leaves (about a quarter or less of what we have in the yard). It took an hour to process all of them. The process is automated but not fast. The goal of using the chipper/shredder is to break down the leaves so they will compost faster. The chipper/shredder only does a fair job at grinding things into really small parts. While all of the leaves are ripped, some of them are still somewhat sizeable. I ran some of these through twice. Three tarpfuls unprocessed take up about three cubit yards of space. The chipping/shredding reduced this by two thirds to about one cubic yard.
It will take nature's processes to fully break them down. Leaves I have processed this way in the past end up good, but shrink to about a third the volume. With as many leaves as we have, there should still be a decent result, maybe a yard or a yard and a half. We've been blessed in the past with a lot of earthworms that seem to love the leaves and do a good job helping turn the pile into good compost.
What is left of the manure compost is ready to go.
The whole process took a lot of physical energy and time. The outlay costs beyond the machinery, tarps, and tools, were only gas and a spark plug. The heavy cost was my time. At the end of doing this one batch, I wondered if it was really worth doing all of this for a yard or two of compost. Strictly in economic terms, it probably isn't. There are compost companies who have bigger machines and that process much more of this stuff much more quickly. I could simply buy the end product for less than it costs me if I were actually paying myself for my time. But, I remind myself that this is part of being self-reliant. The cost of a cross-country trip by a tractor trailer to deliver me some mulch via Lowe's has costs that haven't been fully calculated. I have the raw material ready at hand. And, I love the feel of doing something with the resources I have been given. I'm really not happy on Saturday until I am exhausted.
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