Mulch?

[Royiah]

Ok so I want to mulch both my garden Beds and my walkways to keep grass and weeds from being intrusive in both places. So I was wondering what everyone uses? How much does it usually cost Ya'll? What works best for Ya'll?
I've been thinking about using a pine mulch for my pathways and straw or something for my beds. good or bad idea?

[hendi_alex]

If you are wanting to mulch for weed control, I would suggest that you first put down some kind of barrier. Black plastic, landscape fabric, multiple layers of newspaper, cardboard, all might work as a weed barrier under the mulch. Most of these approaches will need to be renewed each year.

[Royiah]

I was going to do that for the path ways not for the beds themselves.

[gixxerific]

Yes that is a great idea. Straw is good for the garden, I use that and grass. Grass mainly because it is more readily available.

A bit of advice, I find it easier to mulch first, than plant. It is much easier to move the mulch for a planting hole than move that little back in than trying to spread mulch/straw around existing tiny little plants.

[rainbowgardener]

I don't spend money on mulch. Use grass clippings, pulled weeds, fall leaves, etc. I also have a little chipper/shredder (ok, I did spend a little money on that, but one time expense), that I run downed branches and all kinds of woody stuff through for home made wood chip mulch. In summer, if I run out of fall leaves, I may buy one bale of straw.

[Royiah]

Yes that is a great idea. Straw is good for the garden, I use that and grass. Grass mainly because it is more readily available.

A bit of advice, I find it easier to mulch first, than plant. It is much easier to move the mulch for a planting hole than move that little back in than trying to spread mulch/straw around existing tiny little plants.

That's good to know but I don't want to use grass clippings because it'll just make it harder to weed my beds.
Bit too late now since everything is already planted. But I'll keep that in mind for next year!

[Royiah]

I don't spend money on mulch. Use grass clippings, pulled weeds, fall leaves, etc. I also have a little chipper/shredder (ok, I did spend a little money on that, but one time expense), that I run downed branches and all kinds of woody stuff through for home made wood chip mulch. In summer, if I run out of fall leaves, I may buy one bale of straw.

I don't like using weeds or grass clippings because of the seed. Last fall I did let the leaves from my trees stay in my bed after they fell and it covered it quite a bit. natural mulch and no work!
I do want to get a chipper but its a bit too expensive for me at the moment.

[gixxerific]

All I can say is come by my garden any time this year and see how many weeds I have using primarily grass mulch. Just saying.

[rainbowgardener]

"That's good to know but I don't want to use grass clippings because it'll just make it harder to weed my beds."

Part of the point of the mulch is so that you don't have to weed. The mulch suppresses the weeds. Granted, depending on how deeply you mulch, you probably will still have some weeds, but way fewer.

[imafan26]

I get where you are coming from. I am having a problem finding a good mulch too. I do use non-woven weed fabric on the paths and that has been the best for keeping weeds from coming out from below. I still have problems with weeds sprouting on top of it. Under my pots I layer newspaper on the weed cloth and that holds down the weeds for a while.

In the paths, newspapers get soggy, rip so they don't work as well.

In the garden. I have started to layer newspaper on the prepared bed and planted through it and then layered more shredded paper on top of it. It packed down a bit after the bed got watered. This is the first time I am trying it, but so far the plants are growing. I am hoping that once the plants get filled out, their canopies will shade the soil so I don't have to do much more. I have been chopping up the garden residues that were healthy and leaving them on top of the bed. They do go through a messy stage, but after that it seems to be working out. I haven't done this long enough yet so the jury is still out. I can't call it a success yet.

I have used pine needles successfully as mulch for weed control. They attract roaches, but have the least problems with packing and harboring weed seeds. I have limited access to pine needles. Hay and straw are not readily available.

I have access to free city mulch at the composting facility, but I have gotten some nasty weeds from it. It also has centipedes which I don't want to bring home.

Grass clippings, I leave on the grass. I don't have a lot of grass and my grass has nut sedge and kylinga so I don't want to bring that into the garden anyway.

I have used Redwood mulch on the garden. It dries out quickly on the top. In the garden it works best with a soaker system since it seems to be a bit water repellent. When I use too thin a layer, the weeds come through it. Too thick and the ground doesn't even get wet. I just seem to be watering the mulch.

[joed2323]

I'm still new at gardening only been doing this for a couple years...

The first time I seen people putting grass clippings on there gardens made me think are they nuts...
I always thought it promotes new weed growth... When I cut to close to my garden it throws grass clippings onto my garden and it seems weeds form from this... I'm hoping someone has a good answer to why it seems this way...

I want to try the grass clippings as mulch but was always afraid to, crazy I may seem

I learn new things everytime I visit this forum...

I don't mind picking weeds since I stay on top of them daily, but I may use mulch this year just to see what the hype is

[rainbowgardener]

If you cut your grass before it goes to seed, which basically everyone does, most grasses don't go to seed until they are tall, then there is no way the grass clippings as mulch are going to add grass seed in your garden bed. I suppose it is possible that a few low weeds had already gone to seed and get mixed in, but pretty unlikely if you are mowing regularly - not time for anything to produce seeds. There have to be seeds in the grass clippings in order for them to produce weeds.

Otherwise, if you put grass clippings down as mulch and some weeds come up, they are ones that would have come up anyway, from the weed seeds already existing in the soil. And you can rest assured that there are fewer of them than there would have been if you hadn't mulched.

Mulch away! It cannot hurt and is valuable in your garden, conserving moisture, suppressing weeds, and then breaking down to help feed the soil.

[skiingjeff]

We plant to use the grass from thatching our lawn as mulch in the garden. Already dead and no seeds.

If needed, we will use the fresh grass clippings. As RBG indicated, we cut before the grass has seeded. Normally we mulch the grass clippings back into the lawn though.

We've also used wood chips but too much wood attracts ants, etc.

We don't normally put down paper or weed fabric. It gets expensive for the fabric and can be a pain to deal with.

Happy mulching!

[Royiah]

Thanks Ya'll! I take into account what Ya'll have said and go from there.

I really doubt wood would make my ant problem any worse then it already is so I'm not really worried about it.

[estorms]

I mulch with anything that is free. I have a big lawn, so I can cut it one day, let the clippings dry, and go over it again the next day with the bagger and pick up the dried grass. It is very soft, like a rabbit's nest and doesn't get slimy like green grass. I use a couple bags of green for the compost pile.