Making wood chips for a future BTE garden

[Melancholy Bear]

We have a lob lolly pine forest that needs thinning. The trees range from 4 to 6 to 8-inches. Loggers are paying very low prices for pine pulp in our area currently, so it's not really worth selling the trees. I was wondering how difficult it would be to cut trees myself and convert them to wood chips for a future Back to Eden garden. I have the trees; I need the chips; I just don't have a way to convert one to the other. What type of chipper or grinder would I need? Or is this not a cost-effective approach at all? What would you do? (I'm not sure tree services would deliver us free chips because we are in a very rural location.)

 

[Bacpacker]

Grinding a tree 6-8" in diameter will take an industrial chipper. Around here I'm not sure that size would even be rentable. Another thing to strongly consider, pine will chips, mulch, compost will change the PH of your soil. I would strongly consider getting your soil tested before using them for that purpose.

 

[Meerkat]

We have a lob lolly pine forest that needs thinning. The trees range from 4 to 6 to 8-inches. Loggers are paying very low prices for pine pulp in our area currently, so it's not really worth selling the trees. I was wondering how difficult it would be to cut trees myself and convert them to wood chips for a future Back to Eden garden. I have the trees; I need the chips; I just don't have a way to convert one to the other. What type of chipper or grinder would I need? Or is this not a cost-effective approach at all? What would you do? (I'm not sure tree services would deliver us free chips because we are in a very rural location.)

MeloncolyB we We were going to do the same thing but after rpicing onr of those chipper for other than very small logs we decided against it.
Maybe see if you can rent one at local or nearest equipment rental pkaces.

 

[Meerkat]

Home Depot rents them too in some areas.

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DESCRIPTION
Model # E920LSHX

With a 790 lb. frame, a high carbon wear-alloy wedge and a 6"x25 lb. wide flange beam, this splitter is built to endure. The knife plate features high wear nylon pads. Torsion axle suspension reduces bounce and improves tracking and towability when transporting. The cushion mounted log cradle is designed to snap out of the way when using the splitter in the vertical position. Safety is standard with a mandatory two-handed control system, cushion mounted log cradle and spring loaded cleaning wedge.

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4-Hour

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4 Weeks

 

[SheepDog]

Why not dig a trough, put the cut logs into it and get a good fire going and then bury the fire. The wood turns to charcoal that can be used whole or broken into chunks the size of pea gravel. Bury that in your garden / growing area and it promote microbial growth that make good soil. You can add sulfur to make it more acidic when you put it into the garden and add white ash (ash from a fire) to drop the acidity. It just depends on what you want to grow.
Note: you need a good bed of hot coals to keep the fire going once you bury it. A little experimenting will show what works. I don't think you can have too much burning coals but your experience may differ.

 

[Woody]

Have you thought of going with Hugelkultur?

Basically just burying the logs or laying them on the ground and covering with soil. They decompose underground and the roots feed off them.

https://permaculturenews.org/2010/0...sforming-woody-debris-into-a-garden-resource/

 

[Meerkat]

Have you thought of going with Hugelkultur?

Basically just burying the logs or laying them on the ground and covering with soil. They decompose underground and the roots feed off them.

https://permaculturenews.org/2010/0...sforming-woody-debris-into-a-garden-resource/

Thats what we did here but it takes a couple years for it to produce. We had HUGE logs in ours. e started it several years ago it is in my thread of hugelkulture.

 

[zoomzoom]

I don't know what a "Back to Eden" garden is but as it relates to wood chips, here's my experience.
I had a wood chipper that would handle up to 2-3" trees/limbs. The 2 happiest days of ownership were the day I bought it and the day I sold it. Definitely not worth the effort involved.
When I do want wood chips, I take a drive to a mill. Using a pay loader, they'll load your truck or trailer and you pay by the bucket load. 1 bucket would easily fill or overflow a pickup truck. Last I got chips, it was about $15 for the first bucket then about $8-10 for each subsequent bucket. I'd have them load my 16' trailer and it would take 2 buckets.

 

[Caribou]

Pine needles are used as ground cover where you don't want anything to grow.

 

[Meerkat]

Pine needles are used as ground cover where you don't want anything to grow.

Not sure but I hear pine needles kill earth worms too..Maybe thats why all those worms we raised died in our rised beds,we had previously put in pine straw.

 

[Meerkat]

I don't know what a "Back to Eden" garden is but as it relates to wood chips, here's my experience.
I had a wood chipper that would handle up to 2-3" trees/limbs. The 2 happiest days of ownership were the day I bought it and the day I sold it. Definitely not worth the effort involved.
When I do want wood chips, I take a drive to a mill. Using a pay loader, they'll load your truck or trailer and you pay by the bucket load. 1 bucket would easily fill or overflow a pickup truck. Last I got chips, it was about $15 for the first bucket then about $8-10 for each subsequent bucket. I'd have them load my 16' trailer and it would take 2 buckets.

Thats right Zoom,I forgot about that. We use to buy pine fine, wood chips etc, from a place .

 

[Terri9630]

Pine needles are used as ground cover where you don't want anything to grow.

Stuff grows just fine down here with the pine needles. They are great at keeping weeds down because they form a dense mat.

https://www.gardenmyths.com/pine-needles-acidify-soil/

 

[MountainGuardian]

I was just about to post the same thing that pine chips will not make for acidic soil. The green chips themselves are acidic yes, but they are not water soluble so they have no effect upon soil PH. As they rot they draw in nitrogen which robs nitrogen from the air and soil so that is a concern until they are fully rotted and mulched. In the process of breaking down the wood chips the bacteria and fungi at work will neutralize the PH as they degrade the chips so that by the time you get soluble materials they are rather close to being neutral PH rather than acidic PH.

I load up to 20 to 30 yards of pine/fir/spruce needles out of my forests into my garden areas each year and I do not have acidic soil at all. I do have a huge proportion of organic material in my soil though which is awesome for growing in.

If you are using wood chips just keep in mind that they "do" pull a lot of nitrogen in the break down process so supplying some extra nitrogen can be helpful.

As for chipping large branches in the 6 to 8 inch arena that would take quite a chipper, you could certainly find a place to rent one though it would be expensive and keep in mind the larger they get the more danger they pose to the user especially an inexperienced user. One thing that you could do is is when you get trees that are 6 to 8 inch diameter is cut it down to where it hits like 3-4 inch diameter and chip the smaller upper 1/2 of the tree and leave the rest for a small pole or post. This would allow you to get by with a smaller, cheaper and safer chipper.

One thing to keep in mind is laying out the branches, "don't throw them in a big pile" and then try to chip them. Lay them out in a long line starting out in the back and lay the trees/branches down side by side. Then move forward and lay the next ones on top of the previous ones and then move forward and lay the next on top of the previous and so on. This allows you to easily grab the bottom base of each tree which will be the largest and feed it directly into the chipper without fighting other branches. You simply start with the chipper at the front of the row and work your way to the back of it each tree will be on top of the one behind it this way. The same method applies to big tree branches.

A close friend of mine owns a tree trimming company and my middle son often times works for him in the summers and I have learned some tricks for the chipping of branches. I log a lot of trees here on my farm and we get massive amounts of branches and I trade out him coming over and helping chip my branches for us going over and helping him trim out his small pine forest like you of the smaller pine trees 6-8 inches diameter and smaller.

I would suggest looking at what it costs to rent a chipper as compared to buying a chipper and then look at what a tree trimming company with a chipper would charge per hour to come out and chip well laid out small trees and compare that. You might be surprised at how cheap it may be to hire a crew to come and chip compared to renting or buying a chipper.