We aim to recycle most woody waste on site, following advice from Caring for Gods Acre to help reduce our carbon footprint, ‘Churchyard trees and shrubs are storing carbon within their roots, trunks, branches and leaves so try to [... ] keep deadwood on site in piles to slowly rot down’.
See Reducing our Carbon Footprint
1. Branch prunings and blown down branches are sawn up into shorter lengths so we can add them to small wood piles along the west wall or taken to the main woody waste store by the east wall. (Royal Mail is on the other side)
2. Leaves (deciduous only) are put in our leaf compost bin against the east wall.
3. Green waste which will not easily rot down or contains seeds / roots of invasive plants such as bramble; ivy; evergreen leaves and branches; solidago; burdock and 3 cornered leek is put in dumpy bags. The full dumpy bags are hung on the railings underneath the huge Copper Beech. Lesley alerts our Council contact that the bags are full and ready for collection. We try to store the empty bags as soon as we spot they are empty and store them in our gardening black bin.
Working Practices
1. It saves a lot of time to separate waste as we work, according to where we will put it for recycling/ collection.
2. Leave time at the end of a session to deal with waste, 15 - 20 minutes seems adequate.
3. Protect everyone’s backs. Waste which will be put in dumpy bags for collection is added to small bags and carried to the larger ones on railings. Do not overfill these large bags as the Council workers have to lift them onto a lorry.
We aim to ensure the area looks tidy and well-managed when we finish a work session.
Lesley Woodward revised 3/12/2025