Wantirna's 1970s family homes come with mature hedges, shrubs and trees. When the offcuts pile up, Ross hand-loads them and takes them to be recycled.
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 Wantirna 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.
Hedge and shrub offcuts from 70s-era 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.
Original gardens cleared for a fresh start.
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.
Dry cuttings and dead plants moved 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-snapped branches cleared from yards.
Most of Wantirna went up in the 1970s and early 1980s, and it still looks like it: brick family homes on good-sized blocks, wide streets, and front gardens with established lawns and shrubberies. The Dandenong Creek parklands run along the western side, and EastLink cuts through the suburb.
Gardens that old are mature, and in a lot of Wantirna yards the plantings are original — conifers, azaleas, hedges and ornamental trees that have been growing for forty-plus years. Pruning them is heavy work, and the offcuts are usually far more than the green bin can handle. A green waste pickup clears the lot in one go.
Conifers and dense hedges were popular when Wantirna was built, and many are still there. Some have grown well past the height anyone intended. Cutting them back — or taking them out — produces a mountain of prickly, bulky offcuts.
Ross is used to dealing with it. He packs the material tightly into the trailer by hand and takes it for green waste disposal, where it's turned into mulch.
Wantirna has a lot of original owners who have been in the same house for decades, and a growing number of young families moving in as those homes sell. Both groups end up needing a garden clean-up: older owners who can't do the heavy work any more, and new owners clearing out what they inherited.
Ross can do a big one-off clear-out, then come back for a regular collection whenever it's needed. No contract, just ring when the pile is ready.
Most Wantirna houses have a driveway along one side, which makes getting the trailer close easy. Where the waste is in the back yard behind a pool fence or a locked gate, Ross will carry it through — just tell him what to expect.
Photos of the pile and the path to it help him give an accurate price and allow the right amount of time.
Spring is when Wantirna gardens take off, and it's when most people tackle the hedges. Green waste pickups get booked out through October and November, so book yours as soon as you know when you'll be pruning.
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.
