A post on mulch
Spaw day 4
3/11/20
Do you have trouble growing plants because of the weather? Do the hot summer days take out your plants, or, alternately, does the winter frost nerf your poor plant babies? Or mabe the soil is just too hard packed, dry, and shitty.
Good news for you. Mulch can fix that.
What is mulch?
Mulch is a ground cover, usually made of shredded plant material like bark, that helps insulate the ground, keeping moisture in and preventing the roots of your plants from being affected by either extreme heat or extreme cold.
How can it improve my soil?
Well.
1. It traps in moisture. This makes your soil softer and easier to work with. You can do much with soil so dry and hard packed that even jumping on a shovel wont get you anywhere. With soft soil you can turn it and add in soil amenders like fertilizers or compost.
2. It gives bugs a home. The contant moisture will encourage more worms to appear, and everyone knows that worms help fix the soil. But in reality most bugs help fix soil. You will find that many different species of beetles call a layer of mulch home.
3. It biodegrades. A nice layer of bark will eventually compost and get broken down by bugs and bacteria and become rich fertile soil. To learn more about compost check out my other post here.
What else can mulch do?
Along with fixing up soil, providing a living space for insects and protecting plants against the elements, it also can help prevent weeds. A nice two inch thick layer of mulch is really hard for even the most determined weed to get through.
Where can i get mulch?
If you do it right, you wont ever have to pay for mulch. Heres some ways to aquire it for free
-In fall you can go around and rake up leaves to use as mulch.
-have you ever seen a massive pile of woodchips on the side of the road or in an empty lot? Grab that! Tree chopping companies often dump HUGE piles of woodchips in random ass places because its cheaper than dumping it in a landfill. You might even be able to comtact a tree chopping company and ask them to dump the woodchips in your yard, ive heard of some companies doing that for free.
-craiglist is your friend. Go on and click on the free section. I live in a town filled with farms and ranches that often have piles of plant material and manure (i know its stinky, but your plants love it) laying around unwanted. Theyd be more than happy if you dropped by and snagged some.
-places that chop up old rubber tires. Chopped up rubber bits wont decompose into fertile soil, but it will still regulate tempurature, hold in moisture, and house some bugs, and since it wont decompose you wont ever have to refill wherever needs mulch, and its a much better use for old tires than just ending up in a landfill.
Add some mulch to your garden and have a wonderful solar punk action week!
We also use grass clippings for mulch, it's probably the easiest to get your hands on :) After I've planted a row of seeds I immediately lay down a layer of clippings on either side of it, that way the seeds will grow faster and I have a clear idea of where my rows are.
