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What's the best mulch?
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Posted by
Just.Write Zone 3 MN (
My Page) on
Mon, May 14, 12 at 7:46
| What do you all use for mulching perennial beds? I currently have wood chips, but an expert gardener recently advised against them (said they fight garden plants for available nitrogen). He suggested using other plants - as in, crowding them close together. I've always thought that encouraged mildew. Don't they need some breathing room?
I've also used cocoa bean shells, which are pretty, but not long-lasting. Other suggestions? |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| They don't tie up nitrogen when used as a mulch---only when incorporated into the soil. My favorite mulch is leaf mould, seconded by compost. I like the soil color of the leaf mould. Wood chips should only be used as a mulch at fast food restaurants, and at banks. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| For my perennial gardens I use my own composted horse manure/stall leavings since I have a continuous supply of it. In some places I'll put down an inch of pine bark fines (sold as a "soil conditioner" a Lowes) over the top of the compost because it is a bit more attractive. Before I had the abundance of the horse manure compost I used just the pine bark fines. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| The best mulch in my book is anything suitable that I can get free. Sometimes wood chips from my electric cooperative, delivered free (sorry annpat), shredded leaves, torn and discarded bags of pine shavings or sawdust pellets sold for animal bedding, grass clippings, wood shavings from my own shop, or a mixture of several ingredients. I don't remember the last time I bought any mulch. :-] |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| Wood chips are a lot easier to gather in bulk than shredded leaves or compost. I used pine bark fines for the first time this year, they look great but I'm concerned that they shed water rather than letting it seep through. Anybody else have this experience? |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| Yeah I love the dark brown color of my pine chips! It looks nice compared to the lush green lawn:-) I only use it around my fruit trees though as a mulch topper I guess you can call it. It helps to keep the soil from getting dried out and hard from the hot @$$ sun around here also! Plus they compost nice after a year or two hehehe |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| I currently have wood chips, but an expert gardener recently advised against them (said they fight garden plants for available nitrogen). Does this so-called expert think that the wood chips are going to somehow suck all the nitrogen out of the dirt under the mulch layer? The only place the chips can sequester nitrogen is right at the soil-mulch interface which is not going to affect the plants roots that are several inches down in the dirt. Keep using them. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| I think mulch or pine bark as a top cover is somewhat of a must around here. Just because Im 4 miles from the beach doesnt mean temps are always cool. And even when they are the sun still gets HOT. The soil around here does not like the sun. It gets hard and DRY...hehehe I could imagine you get it worse in AZ? |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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- Posted by jolj 7b/8a-S.C.USA (My Page) on
Mon, May 14, 12 at 16:19
| I would put down finished compost before wood chips or saw dust. I agree that the wood by product will not hurt your soil/plants. But I have a lot of compost & you will not have to remove the mulch to add compost, if you put it down as a under layer. Compost as a under layer will feed plants & wood chips at the same time. Multitasking is always good, two for one. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| Wow, thanks for all the great feedback. My goals for mulching are 1) retain moisture and (mostly) 2) suppress weeds. We moved into some wooded acreage a few years ago, and hubby created a 20'x30' flower garden with beautiful black swamp dirt - loaded with weed seeds. Even though I've sprayed with herbicide (over a dozen times), used gallons of Preen and pulled weeds till my hands hurt, I can't keep ahead of those hardy weeds. Last year I put down a thick layer of wood chips, hoping to stop them. The weeds laughed, and I again have a bumper crop. Last weekend I spent two full days digging them out by hand, root & all. Hopefully that'll help? BTW, the "expert" was featured in the most recent issue of "This Old House". I just figured he knew more than I - which unfortunately for him, isn't saying much. :P |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| JustWrite, I would have put down a layer of newspapers or cardboard underneath the wood chips to suppress weeds. Very helpful to suppress weed growth for up to a year or so. I use assorted mulches, including wood chips, straw, hay, compost, and leaves. Depends on the bed. In the front gardens, I use aged wood chips because they're more formal looking. I like straw best in the veggie garden. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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| I put down a layer of compost, then use cotton seed hulls. It isn't free but I sure do like it. Looks pretty, lasts a long time, and is soft on my feet. |
RE: What's the best mulch?
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- Posted by MoleX 6b Brooklyn (My Page) on
Mon, May 14, 12 at 23:07
| I just scored about 40 feet of spruce trimmings, my neighbor, a schmuck, cut down this gorgeous 50 foot spruce, to get access to repaint his porch. Anyway I use what ever is free, grass trimmings, leaves, neighborhood finds. I once found a roll of stair runner carpet. It was 18" wide by 60 feet long. My garden looked the a movie theater with the red and black paisley carpet everywhere. |
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