I have two huge sweet gum trees (1 in front yard and 1in backyard) that dump gum balls all year long. What is the best way to get rid of these?

I have been using a mulching mower and have been mowing fairly regularly. I have even tried doing the black trash bag composting method, although from the look of last season's bags it is not working well.

http://www.wvu.edu/~agexten/hortcult/treeshru/sweetgumballcontrol.pdf

I wish I could cut them down, I am in grad school in Mississippi and am only renting the house. I have never seen a sweet gum tree as large as the one in my backyard before, it is HUGE!

TX AG 88, that seems like an amazing product! I will have to look into it. Thanks.

I haven't used it, so it's not a first hand recommendation, just something I found...

Neighbor has a sweetgum tree and he uses a thing called the "nut wizard" to pick them up. It kind of looks like a bingo ball roller cage on a pole. You roll it across the ground with some downward pressure and it picks up the sweetgum balls (or any other nut).

Works pretty well.

The other option is to pay neighborhood kids to pick them up.

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the tree is fairly weak so it is only a matter of time before the tree or a very large branch comes crashing down and destroys some of your property.

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OHHH That makes sense why a perfectly healthy looking tree in my back yard just dropped a large limb on my roof. I thought the tree guy I brought out was full of it when he said it was healthy and just needed to be thinned...

Figure out a way to transplant them...Whitewings love the berries....and hunters would too

Had two big sweet gums when I lived in OKC. Had a guy spray them with some treatment which decreased the production of them a bunch.

They are annoying and not the best tree from a structure perspective, but they are nice to look at when the seasons change.