Blending leaves

[Scottl]

An oven at 100degF for a few hours will do it.  Or outside on a sunny or breezy day.

[peteski]

My oven only goes down to 170 deg F (my toaster oven only down to 200 deg F).  100 degrees sounds like a perfect job for a food dehydrator (which I usually use to speed paint drying on my models).

[jimmo]

I use one of my 1:1 scale autos as a drying oven. Even on a partially cloudy day it still gets warm in there. On a sunny day it works very well.

I'll have to try Alaska Railroader's technique, she has done some of the most realistic model trees I have ever seen.

[peteski]

I'll have to try Alaska Railroader's technique, she has done some of the most realistic model trees I have ever seen.

Yes, between Karin and grove den (Jos) we have couple of tree masters here.

[wazzou]

I don't grind my leaves for leaves necessarily as much as for ground cover and forest floor. 
Thus, for those purposes, I leave the stems and leaf veins intact or not separated from the rest of the material.

[Chris333]

This was a horrible experiment on my part. Seems like the tray of leaves never dried and is now in fact growing fur 

[central.vermont]

This was a horrible experiment on my part. Seems like the tray of leaves never dried and is now in fact growing fur 

What did yo use for the blender.................a horse!!! 

Jon

[peteski]

LOL!  That actually sort of looks like a cow pie!

[davefoxx]

Maybe you should have spread that out a little more to dry out better, by using two or maybe even three plates.

Hope this helps,
DFF

[Scottl]

I always dump the sodden mess onto a rag or old kitchen towel to soak up the excess water.  A day or so in the sun is usually enough to dry it, or the lowest setting of the oven.

[Santa Fe Guy]

Best thing do is not wet the leaves in the blender.

[chicken45]

I would say not microwaving them is key. What does @Hornwrecker do?

[Chris333]

I didn't nuke the ones in the photo. Did that to a much smaller batch. looks the same except the tips of everything is black.

Hey, but thanks for reminding me to toss out that batch too!   

[daniel_leavitt2000]

Have you tried blending them with alcohol instead of water? It would dry much faster and kill the bacteria/fungus that is creating your fur.

[Smike]

Blending them with any kind of liquid is going to bad news. The cellulous is going to stick things togeher if the bacteria doesn’t start growing first.  I’ve always done small batches in a coffee grinder. (as noted above) the blade chops instead of slices.  Then take what comes out and run it through a sifter to remove the large chunks. You don’t end up with a lot at one time, but hey Chris how much do you need for a door?