"How much waste will it generate, then?"

When I go to a new Client, especially a hit-and-run, er, sorry, an ad-hoc one-off project, I usually warn the Client that it will generate a lot of waste, which they will need to dispose of.

They often ask "how much waste?" or, even more fun, they say, casually, "Oh, don't worry, we have a brown bin, and if there's any left over, we can always take it down the tip."

Here's a good example of exactly how much waste is generated, when you - or the previous owners - have neglected a bed for a couple of years, and now decide it's time to clear it all out and start again.

 

Here - left - I was presented with a couple of long, narrow beds, hard up against the house, which had been "designer planted" with Stipa tenuissima, no doubt with the stated intention of "softening the edges of the bed".

 

Well, it worked, pretty much: the grasses were fluffy and covered up any shortcomings in the hard landscaping.

 

 

But after four years or so, they were getting rather big, and many of them had died completely: 

You can see in this photo, right, one of the many dead brown chopped stumps: not very attractive!

So the lady owner realised it was time for a change, and decided to replace them all with something more stylish and elegant.

She therefore asked me to dig them all out, and clear the bed completely.

"It will generate quite a lot of waste material," I warned.

"That's fine," Mrs Client replied, "we have a brown bin."

"It will be considerably more that one brown bin-full," I said, with a wry smile.

"No problem," she replied, "we can take it to the tip." 

See - they all say that! 

Knowing that they didn't have any old compost or bark bags (having only just moved in), I took along a pile of them - black bin bags are way too thin for garden waste, you really need the stout compost/bark bags: and those huge builder bags are fine, but you can't fill them more than a third full, or no-one can lift them. It really is time that someone started producing under-sized builder bags, small enough that two of them will fit across the width of a normal car, but not so small that they are fiddly to fill...

Anyway, in one afternoon, I filled their brown bin up, right to the top: I took home (with permission) two compost bags stuffed full of plants to pot up and re-home, and there was still this much left over:

That's eight large, heavy, muddy, bagfulls to go to the tip. 

More than enough to fill the boot of their car! 

They later said that it took them two runs, because not everyone is prepared to stuff the back of their car up to the ceiling, the way that I do... and there you have it, dear reader, when I say "it will generate quite a lot of green waste", I am not kidding!

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