Cleaning Up Your Yard To Get Ready For Winter? What To Do With All That Stuff

Posted on: 12 November 2015

Before winter sets in, fall is a great time to clean up your yard and get everything ready for winter. If you have a lot of debris outside, below are some tips on what you can do with all your stuff. This keeps it out of the landfill, which is great for the environment.

Plastic Bottles

Toronto consumes approximately 100 million plastic bottles each year, and 35% of those bottles are not recycled. These bottles end up in the landfalls, oceans, lakes, and forests. If you have curbside trash pickup and the trash company recycles, ask them if they can provide you with an extra garbage can to put plastic bottles in. If not, you can take the bottles to a local recycling center. You can also repurpose the plastic bottles by using them in other ways.  For example, for large plastic bottles, you could cut it in half, and put a few holes in the bottom of the bottle to use as a small flower container. This works great for children to start their own garden. There are many other ways you can use your plastic bottles.

Old Bicycles

If you have old bicycles in your yard that cannot be repaired for someone else to use, you can reuse them in other ways.  If you want to recycle the old bicycles, dismantle them first so each component is separate. This means removing nonmetal parts and wheels also. When you are finished, you should be left with only the metal frame and other metal materials. Your bicycles may be made from alloy metal, which is easily recycled at a scrap metal recycling center.  Take the tires to a tire recycling program to be recycled, or have your roadside trash pickup pick them up for you, if they recycle.

Compost

If part of your cleanup involves your yard, you may have grass clippings, leaves, and weeds from a garden. If so, you can start composting these things to use them next spring to give your yard and gardens nutrients. Once you learn how, you can compost other things throughout the year by throwing things like vegetable and fruit scraps, coffee grounds, egg shells, and tea bags into your compost pile.  In the winter, place a few inches of straw over the bin to protect the materials if the bin does not have a lid on it.

Get your whole family involved in helping you with cleaning up your yard, and teach them about recycling. For more information, talk to a professional like Trail Bottle Depot.

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