No. I have seen ads lately for paper made just for that purpose since using newspaper is so popular. If a sufficient thickness of mulch is maintained on the soil then additional layers of paper on the soil should not be needed after the initial layer is digested by the soil bacteria. The primary purpose of the paper is to provide a better sun block to the "weeds" that are growing where the paper is plunked down then most mulch materials can provide.

You probably want brown paper over bright white. Peroxide bleached paper is fine, but no need to put more chlorine in the soil if you can avoid it. Newspaper tends to be groundwood-derived pulp w/o the lignin-removing chemical process and printed with soy inks (in US/Canada), which is one reason it works well in the garden. I would avoid things like old rolls of Christmas wrapping paper.

Hi Dicot,

Thanks for the info. I felt that I could use pretty much any paper excpet the ones you memtion. I will probaly go to home depot and look at the paper they use for painting a room, paper that keeps things clean. i have used straight mulch before but the weeds always come though it. I know the paper will buy me a year or 2.

Dicot I am up in the hills above Palmdale, I grow lilac if ur ever in the neiborhood. I saw that ur in torrance.

Take care and any other help would be great.

Buck

I don't know if you collect the big paper bags of leaves and grass, but I am going to use that paper this year. I will add the stuff in the bags on top of the paper. I use cardboard between me beds.

I have used newspaper in the past and agree it can be tedious.

If you are looking to buy a roll of paper, most newspapers sell the end of their newspaper roll. It's a large roll but with no print. If your town/paper is small enough, sometimes they will give you the paper as long as you agree to bring the roll back once it's empty.

I go to salvage stores and buy whatever inexpensive paper they have that day. In the past this has included blank newspaper, rolls of paper designed to be put on doctor's examination tables, and large squares that were intended for I do not know what (possibly animal cages?).