A Trip or Two to the Tip

Ever since we bought our house at Inverloch about 12 years ago, the back border had been dominated by a row of scraggly cypress trees and an impenetrable barrier of lilly pillys. While the lilly pillys are on our side of the fence, the cypress trees belong to the elderly lady on the adjoining property.

Although these all combine to give us a lot of privacy, they have been progressively getting larger and larger and encroaching more and more into our space. Whenever the kids play cricket in the yard, any ball hit in that direction is almost certainly destined to be lost in the wilderness.

While we have been spending our time in isolation, we have turned our attention to the wilderness. What started as careful "pruning" gradually evolved into a wholesale frontal assault. With the aid of my chainsaw, hedge trimmers and bow saw, we have thrown ourselves into mortal combat with the green enemy.

For a time it became a bit like the DIY haircut. Every time we had another look, we noticed another branch that needed lopping off. The trees got progressively smaller and the pile of branches grew ever larger. The "just one more branch" became a recurring theme. I started to lean further and further over the rear fence to cut off ever more of the neighbour's trees. I kept telling myself that I was actually doing the dear old lady a big favour and saving her paying for an expensive professional tree lopper to do the job.

Today we reached a point where we could really go no further, without possibly risking backyard conflict. Besides that, the pile of cuttings had grown so large that we could hardly move in the backyard. We had to do something about the mess, but the problem was the Bass Coast Council told us that the local tip was "only open for professional gardeners". Apparently it was still closed for ordinary ratepaying residents.

We decided to ring the local Inverloch tip directly and ask them if we could pay them a visit. They obviously knew nothing about the council policy and assured us that there would be "no problem". That was just the news we were looking for. So off we went to retrieve my trailer (which is on permanent loan to my brother in law in Wonthaggi) and started filling it to the brim.

A couple of repeat trips (and about $40) later, we had cleared the pile and the backyard started to look open again. Maggie and I were very much reminded that we aren't young any more, but we did feel pleased with ourselves at what we had achieved. And what about the neighbour ? I don't think she has noticed yet.Read more