Watsonia blocks are changing fast, with old gardens being cleared, houses being sold and units going up. Ross hauls the green waste away.
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 Watsonia 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 leaves from suburban yards.
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.
Pre-sale and end-of-lease tidy-ups.
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 litter and overgrowth cleared for 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.
Storm branches loaded and taken away.
Watsonia is a post-war suburb with its own station on the Hurstbridge line. Much of it was built in the 1950s and 60s, with brick veneer and weatherboard homes on decent-sized blocks. Those original homes often came with big back yards, fruit trees, and hedges along the front fence.
Plenty of those blocks are now changing hands, being subdivided or being tidied up for rent. That brings a steady stream of green waste that the council bin was never designed for. Ross takes it in one go, loading the trailer by hand and taking it for green waste disposal.
When a long-held Watsonia house is sold, the new owners often find a garden that hasn't been properly cut back in years. There might be an old apricot or lemon tree gone wild, a privet hedge, or a back fence lost behind creepers.
Ross clears the lot. He'll take what's already been cut or pulled out, load it by hand and leave the yard ready for whatever comes next.
When a Watsonia house is rented out, the garden tends to slide between tenancies. Landlords and agents often need the yard cleared quickly before new tenants arrive or before photos are taken for a listing.
Ross can usually fit that kind of garden clean-up in at short notice. Photos and the deadline are enough to get a price and a date locked in.
For established homes, the pattern is simple: the green bin handles the lawn clippings and not much more. Spring pruning and autumn leaves quickly create a backlog that sits in the corner of the yard.
A green waste collection every few months keeps it under control. Ross will come when the pile needs shifting. There's no contract or schedule to sign up to.
In Watsonia the busy times are autumn, when the deciduous trees drop everything at once, and spring, when gardens get their big annual cut-back. Summer storms can also bring down branches without warning. Booking early in each season makes it easier to get the date you want.
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.
