Mon 16 Jul 2007
We’ve had an email from the wonderfully-monikered “Cornish Bob”:
we’ve got about an acre of lawn which in the summer gets cut about once a week to every ten days depending on weather.
As you can imagine, it produces a LOT of grass cuttings. Some of it gets composted, some gets put in the chicken pen for them to nibble and scratch through but there’s still a hell of a lot left, which tends to get piled up behind the shed and rots, but not in a nice composty way, just a mushy grass way.
Apart from not cutting the lawn or composting, what can we do with it? We could take it to the local dump and have it composted but we want to find something we can do ourselves, I’m researching the use of grass as fuel but can’t find much on it, if we can get wood pellets made from saw dust, why not dried grass?
My mum and dad use the “tip it out of sight and forget about it” thing too since it can quickly swamp a normal compost heap and cut off the airflow.
So any other ideas? Anyone know anything about the fuel idea?
(Photo by KLatham)





Bobbie
July 16th, 2007 at 11:57 am
It occured to me that you could use it in your flower/vegetable beds as a mulch to keep weeds down. Also, I was wondering how it would work as a weed barrier in garden paths…might be a bit messy but worth a try?
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Bobbie
July 16th, 2007 at 11:58 am
It occurred to me that you could use it in your flower/vegetable beds as a mulch to keep weeds down. Also, I was wondering how it would work as a weed barrier in garden paths…might be a bit messy but worth a try?
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Malva
July 16th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
I was going to suggest using it to mulch a veggie garden too.
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Cornish Bob
July 16th, 2007 at 2:04 pm
Hmm, mulching, won’t that be introducing even more weed and grass seeds into the veg patch though and eventually increase the number of weeds?
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Anita
July 16th, 2007 at 10:58 pm
We don’t attach the bag that holds the clippings, they just fall right back into the lawn and you end up with an even “auto” compost thing going on.
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attilathehen
July 17th, 2007 at 3:10 am
Whatever you do, don’t let it sit in a pile and then feed it to horses. It ferments and then it gives them colic which can be fatal… I don’t know if it would harm other animals though.
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Andy
July 17th, 2007 at 8:58 pm
If you want o compost more, you need to make sure it is mied with plenty of ‘browns’ ie hedge clippings, twigs with a mix of paper (shreddedconfidential waste is ideal) as this keeps air circulating the grass so it composs quickley and more efficiently, you also could add an exccelerator to speed the composting process such as nettle weeds, chicken manure and even human urine!
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Joshua
July 17th, 2007 at 9:03 pm
This may sound gross, but when I worked for a yard care company we used to have grass fights on occation.
It is pretty fun, if you can shower afterward–however, I suggest you use fresh grass…
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Lesley
August 7th, 2007 at 6:09 pm
This brings back happy memories of long hot summers at the caravan site where we had our family holidays. There was a lot of grass to cut, and the owner would pile it up in dumps around the site, usually under hawthorn and elder trees. We used to make dens there.
It doesn’t help you to recycle, but the smell of cut grass still makes me feel happy!
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Kaz
August 22nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Leave the cuttings on the lawn to keep down weeds, and enrich and moisten the soil? (http://www.charityguide.org/volunteer/fifteen/lawn-mowing.htm)
Does your local council provide a garden waste wheelie bin?
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stghm
September 12th, 2007 at 1:31 am
We leave the clippings on the lawn. I don’t see why someone wouldn’t do that.
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TweedBunny
January 13th, 2008 at 11:13 am
Everyone around here leaves the clippings on the lawn as well. Puts the nutrients back in the soil.
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J
February 25th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
Yeah I agree, leave the clippings on the lawn, it’s good for it.
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Annette
September 29th, 2008 at 6:21 am
you guys aren’t thinking big enough, what real usage is there for 1 acre of grass clippings. power a freight liner? fertilise a farm.
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