Free leaf disposal
The public works departments of the city of Vancouver and Clark County are offering free leaf disposal services at various locations for their residents. For more information, visit www.cityofvancouver.us/solidwaste
Despite the rain, Kandi and Travis White appeared determined on Sunday to finish up a yard work project the couple had been putting off at their Hockinson home.
“Just getting a late finish to some summertime projects,” Travis White said as the couple prepared to unload a pile of tree branches onto a yard debris pile at H & H Wood Recyclers in the Orchards area. The couple recently cut down six trees, including an alder a maple and a fir, as part of installing a parking pad on their property for a recreational vehicle.
“We took down some trees so it wouldn’t endanger the RV cover,” Kandi White said.
It was about their fifth trip to the wood recycling facility, but “I lost count,” she said. Luckily for them, it was their last load.
Kandi counted to three and the couple pulled a pile of branches out of the utility trailer while trying to avoid a mud puddle. Their black Lab watched comfortably from inside their vehicle.
It wasn’t raining earlier in the day, but by the time the couple unloaded that last pile of branches Sunday afternoon, the rain was coming down.
Trucks hauling tarp-covered branches and leaves cycled through the facility Sunday afternoon. Some carried yard waste in the bed of a pickup while others pulled their loads in trailers. A U-Haul van full of branches was unloaded by three workers who said they had just trimmed a homeowner’s 40-foot hedges as a way to make some extra cash.
On Saturday, people dropped off an estimated 80 cubic yards of fallen leaves at the wood recycling facility, H & H assistant Breann Conner said. The number for Sunday was expected to be even higher, she said.
Several of their customers were there using a leaf disposal coupon provided by the public works departments at the city of Vancouver and Clark County, Conner said. The coupon allows free disposal of up to 5 cubic yards of leaves.
But leaves weren’t the only plant materials thrown on the heap Sunday at H & H.
Gary Pfingsten of Vancouver dumped out bags of twisted vines and purple mush. That’s all that was left after he pressed 2,500 pounds of Tempranillo grapes while making wine.
“We just finished fermenting them and this is the result of the process,” said Pfingsten, who makes wine as a hobby with about seven other families.
He said the roughly 3,000 bottles of wine the families made this season should be ready to uncork in a few years.
