Incinerator or bonfire?

[d000hg]

I have a garden of about .5 acre after moving house, which requires a bit of rough work as it has gotten quite overgrown.

We're in the country with no neighbours, outside smoke-free zones.

Is it better to use an incinerator or a bonfire for burning the fairly large amount of garden waste I'm going to have over the coming months... bushes, small trees, etc... and why?

Thanks!

 

[Nige F]

Bonfire without a doubt. Because an incinerator is a waste of £££

 

[EddieM]

Hire a chipper and turn it into mulch?

 

[d000hg]

Hire a chipper and turn it into mulch?

I never thought of that. I've quite a lot of yew, is that an issue as I know it's poisonous?

I do quite want to burn things though... childhood memories and all

 

[EddieM]

I never thought of that. I've quite a lot of yew, is that an issue as I know it's poisonous?

I do quite want to burn things though... childhood memories and all

We all like a good primeval burn up of course. AFAIK it's only yew berries that are poisonous.

 

[d000hg]

So an incinerator isn't more efficient then?

The two reasons I thought it might be a good idea were:

1. Might burn hotter so easier to burn green wood and so on
2. Contains the fire... Safer and less mess

 

[Alec_t]

With an incinerator you would have a lot of work cutting all the vegetation down to size, then feeding it in by hand. With a bonfire, just pile it all up and light the blue touch-paper! 0.5 acres should allow a pretty impressive fire .

 

[Gerrydelasel]

I never thought of that. I've quite a lot of yew

Any good sized branches? Your local wood turner would appreciate some yew!

 

[d000hg]

Any good sized branches? Your local wood turner would appreciate some yew!

I don't think so, not so far. Any idea what constitutes a good size for it to be useful?

 

[Gerrydelasel]

About 3 1/2 inch min. diameter can be used for some stuff. Just a thought.

 

[d000hg]

I'll keep that in mind, certainly it'd be nice to use it if possible.

 

[JohnD]

it's safer to contain the fire in some way, using what's to hand. Some people use a steel dustbin on legs with holes in the base. I've used a galvanised water tank and punched holes in it with a pecking hammer. Currently use a cast-iron chimena and poke trimmed branches down its chimney, and small material into its belly. Has the advantage that I can cook sausages during breaks. It will be slower but safer than a bonfire, and burn cleaner.

You need some kind of fireproof container.

Hot smuts may blow around and ignite nearby dry material.

 

[StephenOak]

I have about a third of an acre that was pretty full of self-planted trees, bushes, etc.

I have given away quite a bit of wood on my local Freegle group,
https://www.ilovefreegle.org/ ,
not just logs but also thinner stuff. Where you are there may well be people with open fires.

I have a shredder and I have shredded lots of the thinnest stuff (up to 40mm), some I have used on the garden and some I have given away on Freegle.

I do have an incinerator (a wire mesh box) in order to contain the fire like JohnD says, but I did not use it much and so I put it away.

What I do use is a large double wooden compost bin, rather like this
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Classic-Double-Twin-Wooden-Compost/dp/B0016N6OTG
which I got for nothing on Freegle! However you can build something with pallets or scrap wood.

I have a number of Dalek compost bins but stuff took quite a long time to break down in them, they are not that big, 220 or 330 litres. Each part of the wooden compost bin holds c. a cubic metre and stuff in there gets a lot hotter (>50C easily and 65C at times) and breaks down a lot faster. I filled both parts with loads of shreddings last June time, I merged them when they had broken down enough and by November the compost was broken down enough to (mostly) go through a 1" sieve. I used quite a bit of that compost in March when I planted some trees and a hedge and it looked good, well broken down.

Most of my trees (well the ones I cut back / down) are laurel, but I have a fair bit of holly and some yew. It all goes in the compost bin.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

I never thought of that. I've quite a lot of yew, is that an issue as I know it's poisonous?

I do quite want to burn things though... childhood memories and all

Ooh do a baked potato for me!

 

[Ian H]

I bought an incinerator and it was good but a bit slow. After a few beers I emptied it onto the pile of wood and had a bonfire instead.

This time I saved a few small logs for inside:

And a couple of bit made into modern art instead of that rusty Chinese rubbish: