scot29
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mulching

In the past I have used bailed straw & grass clippings. These things work pretty well, but I'm always open to new ideas. I've heard you can use newspapers, but I've been hesitant to put all that ink into the soil. Maybe it's perfectly fine though.
After a section has been harvested & nothing else is going in its place, I put down regular black plastic which keeps that area clean. Maybe this same plastic could be used around warm-loving crops, and just pulled back when water is needed?
Anyway, just curious what other people use. Tks :)

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soil
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two words

leaf mold.

scot29
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What do you mean by leaf mold?

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Ozark Lady
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If it works for you, why change it?

When you are putting down the black plastic and leaving the bed bare for any long period of time, you are solarizing the soil. Which is actually a good thing, if you don't over do it. You can get it very hot under there and kill off alot of bacteria and organisms. The good news is: most of the good guys like heat.
But, too much of any good thing is still too much, if you keep leaving it there, you can sterilize your soil to the point it has nothing at all there, bad or good.

It is a good idea to rotate which areas you are solarizing and try to do them all from time to time, as a disease preventative.

Black plastic and mulch are not the same thing at all. Where I live black plastic, heats and cooks the soil. Mulch cools are protects the soil.

You can use black plastic early on, and just warm, not cook the soil, then when it warms up outside, cover it with mulch, and you can run a drip irrigation system under the plastic, or you can simply water in the planting holes.

I have never used newspapers, but see them recommended in lasagne gardening. I did try cardboard boxes, I was not impressed with the results, and I still had alot of weeds come through. And I thought the cardboard felt slimy, so it grossed me out, I removed it.

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soil
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What do you mean by leaf mold?
basically all the fall leaves that end up on the ground, and pile them in a bin. let them rot for a year, then use it as mulch. not only do you block weeds from growing, you also feed the soil.

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rainbowgardener
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US newspapers are printed with soy ink; there is not an issue with using them as mulch. Used whole they tend to mat down and prevent air and water from getting to your soil and take a long time to break down. Laying down newspaper like that is useful for things like killing lawn grass if you want to create a veggie bed, but not for growing things in. But if you run the newspaper through a shredder, it becomes a nice fluffy mulch.

Agree with the above. Plastic suppresses weeds, but does nothing for your soil .. over heats it, prevents air and water from getting through. Organic mulches break down and feed the soil while holding moisture, keeping it cool etc. You've been using straw and grass, that sounds like a great choice; why change it?

Joyfirst
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I was wondering too, would wood shavings work as a mulch for veggie garden?

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soil
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fresh wood shavings will "steal" nitrogen from your soil. which means when you add them. they are rich in carbon, and want to decompose. so the micro organisms take some nitrogen from the soil and use it up to help decompose the shavings. its best to let the shavings age a year or more for even better results or simply compost them.

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mtmickey
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What about pine needles as mulch? I have no trees with leaves, but an overabundance of pine needles, which we usually just burn. Can I use them for mulch?

garden5
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mtmickey wrote:What about pine needles as mulch? I have no trees with leaves, but an overabundance of pine needles, which we usually just burn. Can I use them for mulch?
Well, one issue you may run into with the pine needles is that you will cause the soil to become acidic. Unless you have very alkaline soil, you may want to keep the pine needles out of the garden and just keep them around the blueberry bushes, azaleas, and rhododendrons, all of which like acidic soil.

Here is a mulching question (though I should probably just give it its own thread :roll:): which is better; hay or straw? Are they equally good?

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rainbowgardener
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Hay and straw come from the same plants. Hay is the first cutting and has the tops of the plants, so a lot of seeds. You are likely to get weeds from it. Straw is the next cutting, just the stalks. Cheaper and less weeds, but woodier, doesn't break down as fast.

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jal_ut
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Hmmmm, where I came from, Hay is alfalfa cut and cured at the peak of its protein content. Just as it starts to bloom. Sometimes hay is also grass or clover cut just as it blooms and is also at the peak of its protein content.

Straw is what is left of grain crops after threshing. It is often baled and used as litter or bedding. Straw is the mature dry stem of crops like barley, wheat, and oats.

Hay is green, straw is yellow.

Hay (as described above) has many more nutrients in it than straw (as described above). That is why hay is fed to animals and straw is used to bed the same animals.

Applied to your garden as mulch the same would apply. Hay has more benefits. It also costs about 5 times as much. Sometimes one can find moldy hay that got wet from the rains and was tossed aside by the farmer because he won't feed moldy hay to his animals. This makes good mulch or compost, if you want to compost it, and the farmer will likely give it to you.

I have found straw to be excellent mulch. You will get some weed seed in hay or straw. It depends on how weedy the plot was that it came from. Straw will have some of the seed of the crop. Grass hay will have grass seed in it. It doesn't matter. The weeds that grow make mulch too. :)

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jal_ut
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Black plastic is not mulch. It is a killer. Put it down on an area to kill everything. Clear plastic actually works better because it lets the sun shine on the soil to make it hotter. If you are wanting an easy way to remove grass and weeds from a plot this will do it. It will also kill the micro community in the soil. I don't think this is too serious though as the spores of the bacteria, molds, fungi and yeasts are on everything anyway. They will quickly inhabit the area and become active again as soon as you remove the plastic.

This practice has gained the name "Solarizing". You may want to do some research on that?

garden5
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So, in the hay vs. straw discussion, we can conclude that hay has more nutrients in it, but costs more and has more seeds, which will eventually produce weeds.

Straw, on the contrary, is cheaper and has fewer seeds, but takes longer to break down and has fewer nutrients.

Thanks to RG and Jal for clearing this matter up; I was always a little foggy on it.

So, should stray and/or hay be composted/rotted before you spread it on your garden, or won't it hurt to put the fresh stuff out?

Thanks for the tips, all.

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jal_ut
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So, should stray and/or hay be composted/rotted before you spread it on your garden, or won't it hurt to put the fresh stuff out?
You can put it on fresh as mulch. The living soil community of worms, insects and microbes, will eventually reduce it to humus and compounds available to the plants as food. Besides covering the soil to slow the emergence of weeds, a mulch enriches the soil.

If you want to compost if first, build a pile that will get hot and you can kill most of the weed seed. Composting straw or hay will reduce its volume dramatically. It is then best used as a soil amendment. If you want a mulch to smother weeds, and conserve moisture it may be best to use it fresh.

garden5
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Thanks, Jal; that clears things up a lot!

Now, about leaves. I have a pile that was raked up in the fall, has rained and snowed on, is a little smaller that when it started, but was never turned. Now, I know that it certainly does not fall into the leaf mold category....probably fits best in the soggy leaf pile category. Could I still spread these on my garden, or do I want them composted, first. Given their high carbon content, I'm thinking that they may leech some of the nitrogen and microbes from the soil as they break down.

Anyone have any leaf tips?

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jal_ut
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Given their high carbon content, I'm thinking that they may leech some of the nitrogen and microbes from the soil as they break down.
I don't really have the answer for that question. In the end though the leaves will add nutrients to your soil and feed the microbes. Personally I wouldn't hesitate to use leaves as mulch. I can't see them being any worse than straw or hay to use nitrogen in their decomposition. I do put loads of leaves on my garden in the fall and till them in. Come spring those underground are pretty well decomposed, but there will still be quite a few on top that look whole. What I try to do is put much more back onto the plot than I take off. This way the soil maintains its fertility.

It has been said that wood shavings or sawdust will tie up some nitrogen. I don't really have any experience with sawdust in the garden. Many people use horse manure that is heavy in sawdust or shavings and seem to get along fine with it.

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G5 has been paying attention! :D

If you add some nitrogen side to that leaf duff, like coffee grounds, composted manure or the like, then nitrogen lock-up isn't likely...

See there is a cost to everything, either in labor or inputs. Balancing is the best thing you can do for your wallet, back and garden...

HG



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