Rural-residential lots, new estate streets and a lot of open grassland in between. Ross loads and removes the green waste around Diggers Rest, with the fire season in mind.
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 Diggers Rest 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.
Loads from acreage and larger lifestyle blocks.
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.
House yards cleared on semi-rural properties.
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 fuel cleared around the house and sheds.
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.
Limbs brought down by the wind across open country.
Diggers Rest is a small township on the edge of the plains, close to the Calder Freeway and with a station on the Sunbury line. It has a mix of older houses, newer estate homes and rural-residential properties on larger lots, all surrounded by open, grassy country.
Life on the edge of open grassland comes with a lot of grass. Spring rain brings fast growth, summer turns it dry and brown, and strong winds bring down branches and blow debris across properties. That means a constant supply of green waste, and a real need to clear it before the hot weather.
On the bigger Diggers Rest properties, the house yard is usually just part of the picture. There are fence lines, sheds, driveways and paddock edges that all collect growth, fallen branches and piles of prunings over the year.
Ross focuses on the area around the house and sheds, picking up and taking away the green waste. For large clean-ups, the job may be split over several trailer loads.
Grassfires move fast across open country on a hot, windy day. The CFA declares a Fire Danger Period for the area each year, and it pays to have the dry grass, litter and prunings cleared away from buildings before that happens.
Burning off is heavily restricted once the Fire Danger Period is on, so loading the material up and taking it away is often the most practical option. Cut grass goes on the same load.
Many rural properties around here have rows of trees planted to break the wind, and they drop a lot of material. Branches come down in storms, and the ground underneath collects bark and leaves.
Ross picks up branches that are already down and removes them along with the litter. Standing trees that are damaged or leaning are a job for an arborist.
Around Diggers Rest the grass usually cures, going from green to dry, some time in late spring. Book your clean-up for October or early November while the growth is still manageable and before everyone is trying to get ready for the Fire Danger Period at once.
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.
