Brown Gold

I've had my SHD Troy-Bilt shredder/chipper for ~25 years. I vaguely remember it cost close to a grand back in the late 80's when I bought it.

 

Last year, I had it serviced at the end of the season...and yesterday I cranked it up for the first time in 2013. It started on the first pull, and ran like a finely tuned Ferarri.

 

We have plenty of trees on our property; mostly oak, hickory, maple and a few cherry trees. We also have an oversupply of free leaves every fall. I spent over an hour shredding leaves yesterday, and probably have another hour to go today.

 

I also harvested all of the remaining unripened peppers and tomatoes, ripped out the plants for the compost pile, and started building my supply of brown gold for next year's garden. I also read somewhere that Moruga Scorpion pepper plants can be brought indoors and treated like perennials, so I'm going to give that a shot and see how they fare in our sunroom. The plants are almost four feet tall now, so it'll be interesting to see what happens next year provided they make it through the winter indoors. 

 

Per the second picture below, as an experiment this year, I grew my Scorpions ( 3 plants each ) in containers. They did exceptionally well.

 

Spending 5+ hours working outside yesterday, I was truly content.

 

 

Above: Last harvest of peppers and tomatoes.

Below: Moruga Scorpion plants

 

 

Above/below: My shredder turns leaves into an incredibly fine mulch

( brown gold ) which breaks down quickly.

 

 

 

 

Above: The pumpkin plant got hit with the first killing frost.

Below: Our backyard - Trees and leaves. More than enough of both.