High up the mountain, Olinda blocks catch wind, rain and a constant drop of leaves and branches. Ross clears it and takes it off the hill.
Not a franchisee or a truck driver from a booking system. The bloke who quotes it is the bloke who loads it.
No bags to fill, no skip to load. Leave it in a pile and he loads it, sweeps up and takes it away.
Not a bin size. A heap beside the driveway and one at the bottom of a steep yard are different jobs and get different prices.
Standing tree, asbestos, or more rubbish than garden — he tells you before he starts, not after.
A pruning pile hauled away and a few bags of leaf litter collected is the usual combination on a Olinda block.
Piles of prunings, branches, hedge trimmings, leaves and weeds that won't fit in the green bin. Ross backs the trailer in, loads it himself and takes it away to be recycled — you don't lift a thing.
Prunings and leaf fall from mountain gardens.
Doing a big garden clean-up — overgrown beds, a back corner nobody has touched in years, a rental between tenants or a property being tidied for sale? Pile it all up and Ross collects the lot in one visit.
Large gardens that have outgrown the owners.
Fallen limbs, shed bark, leaf litter and dry prunings gathered up from around the house — the fine fuel that matters most in a grassfire or ember attack. Collected and taken away before the Fire Danger Period starts.
Fuel reduction around homes before summer.
A gum has dropped a limb across the driveway, or a windy night has left the yard covered. Ross collects what's come down and hauls it away. Standing trees and hung-up limbs are an arborist's job — once they've dropped it, Ross can take it away.
Wind-thrown branches on exposed high ground.
Olinda is near the top of Mount Dandenong, and it is known for its gardens — the National Rhododendron Gardens are here, and plenty of private properties have similar collections of rhododendrons, azaleas and European trees growing under the tall eucalypts.
At this altitude, the weather is wetter and windier than down in the suburbs. That means bigger growth in spring, heavier leaf fall in autumn, and more branches brought down by storms. Ross handles bulk green waste in Olinda: big pruning jobs, overgrown gardens and storm clean-ups, all hand-loaded and taken away.
Some Olinda gardens have been developing for decades and are closer to small parks than suburban yards. Keeping them in shape means regular heavy pruning of shrubs, hedges and understorey, and the piles that result are often several trailer loads.
Ross can do multi-load jobs, either in one long day or spread over several visits. He'll give you a clear idea of how many loads to expect from the photos.
Olinda is exposed to strong winds from several directions, and when the ground is soaked after winter rain, branches come down regularly. Sometimes they block driveways; sometimes they land on garden beds or fences.
Ross collects fallen branches and removes them. If a tree is damaged or has a limb hung up in the canopy, get an arborist in first — it is not safe to clear underneath until that is sorted.
Olinda sits in heavy forest near the top of the range, and the risk in a bad fire season is very real. The goal before summer is to remove fine fuel from around the house: leaves, bark, dead shrubs and cut material.
A fire season clean-up gets that fuel off the property entirely. On larger blocks, Ross can collect from several heaps in the one visit.
Big Olinda jobs can take more than one day, so it pays to book early. Aim for September or October to have everything cleared before the Fire Danger Period begins.
Suburb, roughly how much there is, and what the access is like. A photo saves a lot of back and forth.
Ross comes back with a number. On big or awkward jobs he has a look first rather than guessing.
Loaded by hand, driveway swept, and off for proper green waste disposal.
Ross runs this on his own. He quotes the job, he turns up, he loads the trailer and he takes it away — the same bloke every visit. There is no office in between, no skip company, and no franchise cut coming out of what you pay.
It also means he will tell you when something isn't his job — a standing tree that needs an arborist, or a pile that is more rubbish than garden — rather than taking the money and leaving you with half a problem.
The suburb, roughly how much there is, and how easy it is to get a trailer to it is enough to work with. A photo of the pile gets you a price fastest.
Prefer to talk? Call or text Ross on 0416 030 925. Monday to Saturday, daylight hours — weather permitting.
Get a price on your pile. Takes a minute — Ross reads them himself.
Thanks — that's gone through to Ross. Spring is his busiest time, so if it's close to fire season he may take a day or two.
