Orchard country in the Yarra Valley foothills. Ross clears prunings, windbreak debris and garden waste from Wandin North properties.
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 Wandin North 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.
Orchard prunings and rural garden waste.
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.
Overgrown house gardens on rural lots.
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.
Grass and dry material cleared 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.
Windbreak branches down after storms.
Wandin North is fruit-growing country — orchards, berry farms and small holdings spread across rolling hills between Lilydale and Seville. The Warburton Highway runs through, and the Lilydale to Warburton Rail Trail follows the old line nearby. Residential properties range from town blocks to rural lots with a few acres.
Orchards and rural properties generate a lot of green waste: pruning cuts, windbreak trimmings, overgrown fence lines and garden waste from around the house. Ross provides green waste pickup in Wandin North, clearing piles by hand and taking them away.
Pruning season in Wandin North produces big piles of woody cuttings. On small holdings without a mulcher or a burn-off window, those piles can sit around for months.
Ross takes fruit tree prunings along with any other garden waste. He can collect from several spots if the trailer can get close or he can carry.
This suits hobby growers and house blocks with a handful of old fruit trees more than commercial orchards. A few rows of apples or cherries pruned over a weekend is the sort of heap one trailer handles well; a whole commercial block is better suited to a mulcher on site.
Wandin North properties often have long driveways, paddock gates and ground that gets soft in winter. Planning access ahead makes the job smoother.
Let Ross know where the trailer can go, where it can turn and whether any gates need to stay closed. If ground conditions are poor, he'll carry from firm ground.
Rural properties in the Yarra Ranges carry bushfire and grassfire risk. Before summer, grass needs cutting and dry material around buildings needs clearing.
Ross can take away the dry material and old pruning piles in one visit, so the fuel is gone before the Fire Danger Period.
Winter pruning piles are best cleared in early spring, well before the grass dries off and the Fire Danger Period is declared for the Yarra Ranges.
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.
