Abstract: A bale shredder tears a bale apart from the end and advances the bale longitudinally into the shredder. The shredder has a centrifugal fan with at least one rotor mounted thereon. There are knives on the fan and on the rotor and there is a loosely fitted collar of blades around the fan. As the bale is advanced into the fan, the knives on the rotor are wiped across the bale by the compound motion of the rotating fan and rotor and tears it apart. The knives on the fan cooperate with the blades in a scissoring action to shred the material torn loose by the rotor. The shredded material falls through the blades and is blown out the shredder by vanes on the centrifugal fan.