Chipper Shredders

Anyone who owns even a small piece of land that enjoys taking care of it needs to have a chipper shredder. We only have about a half acre but it seems something always needs trimming. This chipper is almost 30 years old and still works great. The 9 hp motor will drive the chipper to devour anything up to 2 inches in diameter. Larger limbs are fed into the feed area on the left side of the chipper while the large hopper on the right side is for smaller twigs and leaves.

Of course this is no toy, any youth should be watched closely around it since is knows no difference in a tree limb being fed into it from the limb of a curious child. It can also spit chunks and small chips of wood back out at you, it's advisable not to stand directly in front of the feed areas. Also green limbs are better for chipping, small dry limbs are OK but if it gets close to an inch in diameter, be careful. Dry limbs will be yanked out of your hand then used to strike your knuckles before you can get your hand away. Trust me, this is not a good feeling.

	It doesn't take much trimming to come up with a sizeable pile of rubbish. My city does roam the neighborhoods picking up debris like this, so I do have the option of just dragging it to the street and letting lay in the front yard until they make their rounds.
	In thirty minutes of so the pile of debris was turned into enough mulch for about half of my strawberry bed. The mulch will act as weed control short term and long term nutrients for the strawberries. I have more trimming to do, so finishing the strawberry bed will not be a problem.

In the post Spring in Indiana - Prepping the Garden, I gave this warning:

One word of warning, commercial mulch is treated with fungicides and insecticides, so you shouldn't use this mulch around the foundation of your home or you could end up with a terrible insect problem.

I will have to watch for insects in the strawberries. If an insect problem does start, I can easily treat the bed with a garden insecticide.