Oh dear, now I don't know what to get. The material we have is not pure leaves, we already have a leaf-mould pile. It's leaves mixed with very young branches that we have. The young branches will break down in time, but shredding them will speed things up. I'll look at all of your various suggestions, and am hoping that shears and elbow grease are not the best option!
I'm very pleased with the Bosch one I have. I have a long cotaneaster hedge that I prune, the branches are 1ft to about 8ft in length - no need to trim off the side bits so long as they're flexible, just poke one end in the chute and it self feeds. I disposed of 2 entire mature pyracanthas which took no time - it broke down well in the compost, but I did get some thorny surprises. If it's mostly shrubby stuff with or without leaves it works well. It wouldn't work on dead annuals, nettles and stuff that is entirely green, it'd just mush it up a bit. You can poke quite leafy stuff through so long as you have some branches/woody stuff to help it through. The resulting littler is quite coarse, but along with grass clippings and the like it has made some lovely compost. There are some photos on the site I mentioned above that show the end result
PS - have a look on youtube for models you're considering. It helped me
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
It’s makes a chore into a pleasure. Just watching it chew up tree branches like toothpicks with its raw 8hp of power is a delight. I’m a middle aged man and my wife won’t let me have a Ferrari to play out my mid life crisis, so this is the next best thing.
Hereis what NOT to buy. I got this to try and start my own compost heap and whilst it copes well with tree branches, it clogs up quickly with the thin ones (which get wrapped around the nut on the blade turning mechanism) and struggles with leaves and softer things. I am a bit disappointed because it means that I can only really shred "browns" for the compost but not the greens.
Yeah I got one of those a couple of years ago - it was a godsent when I first got it but the constant jamming really wears thin.
Plus the blade was wrecked fairly quickly, which you wouldnt expect for something designed to cut through wood.
I did get through a mountain of branches with it though, so if you cant afford to spend more and you have a lot of time and patience...
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Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
I have a long cotaneaster hedge that I prune, the branches are 1ft to about 8ft in length - no need to trim off the side bits so long as they're flexible, just poke one end in the chute and it self feeds.
I disposed of 2 entire mature pyracanthas which took no time - it broke down well in the compost, but I did get some thorny surprises.
If it's mostly shrubby stuff with or without leaves it works well.
It wouldn't work on dead annuals, nettles and stuff that is entirely green, it'd just mush it up a bit.
You can poke quite leafy stuff through so long as you have some branches/woody stuff to help it through. The resulting littler is quite coarse, but along with grass clippings and the like it has made some lovely compost.
There are some photos on the site I mentioned above that show the end result
PS - have a look on youtube for models you're considering. It helped me
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.