eoloe - 182 - 12/12/2025 - Picado de ramón en olivar.

December 12, 2025. Good day and thank you very much for visiting our channel “eoloe” on the free internet video hosting service: YouTube. We are well aware that the necessary pruning of our olive saplings (including the white-leaf and pointed varieties) has left the wood of their trunks and branches more exposed to the sun. However, we are confident that the fertilization and soil work we will carry out during the autumn, winter, and spring will increase their foliage sufficiently so that before next summer they will once again be properly protected from ultraviolet rays. In our region, we call all the branches of the saplings that Juan Campaña pruned last October “ramón,” as well as the remains scattered around the olive trees after the felling, once the usable trunks have been removed and cut into pieces for firewood. After pruning or felling, it's necessary to windrow the branches to make shredding faster. So, if you didn't see it when we posted it, on our YouTube channel (link: @eoloe./videos), video number 109, titled "Widening Branches in an Olive Grove," shows how we do it using forks that speed up the process and considerably reduce the physical work involved compared to doing it solely by hand. Before we started using agricultural shredders, popularly called "chippers," we piled all the branches up with the help of a branch-collector or other farm implements in designated areas we had set up on each plot of our property. These areas were open enough so that the flames wouldn't affect the olive trees closest to the bonfires we lit, some of which were quite large. After burning completely and turning to ash, we didn't use the ash for anything. We carried out the burning in the spring, after requesting and obtaining the necessary authorization from the Regional Agricultural Office. Using the chipper requires no bureaucratic procedures, and more importantly, we completely avoid the risk of starting a fire. Until now, because we fell half of our olive trees one year and the other half the following year, after windrowing the branches in the center of the rows or furrows, José Luis Jiménez manages to chip them all in just two full days of work. For this reason, we continue to opt for renting a chipper every year, since if we had bought one, with the very little use we give it, we would need another lifetime to recoup the cost. It is true that as all our saplings become mature olive trees, when they reach maturity, instead of two days, we will need four days each year to chip the branches generated by their pruning and felling. But even so, we will continue to rent it, because it will remain much more economical and practical. The great and significant advantage of using the shredder is that by shredding all the mulch in the center of the rows, the remains, when they dry completely and decompose, become organic fertilizer for the soil, providing fiber, calcium, potassium, and protein. This also contributes to denser and more vigorous growth of the ground cover we create and maintain during the autumn and winter, once the rains cause the grass to sprout. During the shredding process, Aziz Karroum's job is to collect all the branches that the shredder rollers don't catch, or those that, due to their position, are repelled by the rollers. He then places them behind the tractor or on the edge of the next furrow so that they are also shredded and not scattered across the land. If they weren't collected, they would be an obstacle to other tasks we'll be doing later. Thank you so much for watching this video, and we wish you all the best. The link to our blog is: https://www.eoloe.es/blog-2/