Allotments 4 All

I use shredded paper in my compost and, having read all this I now want to use crunched up newspaper insred......do I just tear and crush.. and at the risk of sounding daft....can I do it with quite large sheets, (obviously much quicker ) or do I have to tear it quite small. I ask because I put quite a lot of shredded paper in ( including till receipts..oh dear shall have to stop that )....and it does get compacted sometimes.

Hi Frannie and Phil, nice to see I'm not the only newbie around here.  :)  Have you seen all those stars some of the posters have?  They must be very clever peeps.   ;D

Phil, do people use shredded paper as mulch?  Sounds a bit messy to me and I doubt it would deter slugs and snails.  I've known the little blighters to eat the paper labels off plastic containers of plant food before now.   :(


G xx

Hi All

I had always wondered about the benefits of putting shredded papers onto the compost.  My question is, would it be practical and possible to shred paper and wood branches at the same time - awaiting delivery of new garden shredder as I speak.  This way there will be a true mixture of fibres.  I have a paper shredder but don't make use of the end result  :-[.  Has anyone done this or will the paper just get jammed in the new shredder.

Lily :)   

We have a garden shredder but I don't use it for paper, two potential problems that I can see:  Firstly, I think it might clog things up -at least if your shredder is like mine. Secondly, I think you probably want to put shredded paper in your heap to dry it out a bit when you've too many grass clippings or the like. With branches, hedge prunings and the like I think you might just dry out your heap too much.

Jeremy

Thanks you derbex for the sound advice.  I'll keep the paper shredder for paper and the garden shredder for just that, the garden/allotment. I'll probably use the shredded privet hedge as a mulch around the fruit bushes.

Lily

I might try using shredded paper as a mulch around my strawbs this summer instead of hay/straw. 

I just crumple the paper up as it is, I don't wrip it,  Mum does all the shredding and delivers it to me in nice sacks ready for use.

Quote from: EJ - Emma Jane on March 01, 2005, 12:09:09
I might try using shredded paper as a mulch around my strawbs this summer instead of hay/straw. 

This occurred to me whilst I was down the allotment on Sunday.  As I have just bought Mrs Wivvles a paper shredder for her birthday, I shall definitely be testing it out this year!!

What a good idea to put shredded paper around the strawberries.  I was just thinking about buying some straw but if the shredded paper works then I can save some money.

What else can shredded paper be use for, compost, mulch.

Would it be safe to use it for storing fruit and veg at harvest time or will the inks contaminate the produce.  :-

Lily

EJ, let us know how it works using shredded paper around the strawberry plants. I bought a bale of straw last year and still have about half of it left. One bale turned out to be a lot of straw, more than I thought.

I can take an endless supply of shredded paper from work and thought about a use for it in the lottie. I wonder if paper doesn't absorb water too much to put around the strawberry plants causing the strawberries to lay on a wet surface. The straw remains a nice and airy bed for the low fruits to lay on. With my luck, the night after I put paper down, we'd get a gale and the whole complex will be decorated with white ribbons hahaha. I could put the netting over the strawberry bed early of course, right after putting the paper down. The straw, after being patted down a bit, seems to form more of a mat and not blow away so easely.

One tip: Don't put anything around the strawberries too early, you want the sun on the soil in early spring to warm it up quickly.

I can get a lot of shredded paper from work and use it as a base layer under straw and hay in the "bed" part of my guineapig's cage!
Incidentally - our used company newspaper goes to the local vet to put in the cages of the post operative animals. 
Helen

ptennisnet,   does that mean you won't put them on your heap but you will put them on the council's heap?   Does the higher temperature in their heap destroy the bisphenol-A?   This a fairly simple organic molecule:  won't the bugs in your heap break it down?

I'm afraid I put all paper on my heap,  just crumpled up:  it disappears somewhere!

I also use sheets of paper,  laid flat,  as a weed suppressing mulch around gooseberry bushes and raspberry canes.   It looks better if you cover it with a very thin layer of soil!   After a couple of months the remains go on the heap.

I don't know how it would break down - a valid point, it could break down easily, although my compost heap is very definitely cold.  I won't put them on my heap as it would form a much larger proportion of the total compared to the councils' heap.