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Mulching your organic garden is probably easier than you may think, and can be accomplished for practically free. Mulching helps make your home gardening efforts less work and more productive, so you can put your energy and creativity into growing more of what you love, whether that's peonies or chili peppers.
To mulch is simply to cover the soil around plants with a protective material, and this simple gardening step can benefit your garden in many ways.
Using organic mulch can:
- Reduce weed growth and thereby save the gardener many hours of laborious weeding.
- Maintain uniform moisture conditions in the garden by decreasing water loss through evaporation and decreasing soil erosion caused by heavy rainfall. Moisture retention means less watering and more water conservation.
- Organic mulches add nutrients and humus to the soil as they decompose, improving its tilth and moisture-holding capacity.
Types of organic mulch:
- Sawdust: Best for use in garden paths and around established, permanent plants, because fresh sawdust can crust and prevent moisture penetration. Readily available from sawmills, and generally inexpensive.
- Hay or Straw: Recommended for fruit and vegetable plantings, and for overwinter protection for more fragile perennials.
- Pine Needles: Great for shrubs and trees and anywhere long-lasting mulch is desired. Readily available.
- Grass Clippings: A two-inch layer of dry grass (avoid crab grass or treated grass) provides excellent weed protection. Too thick a layer will layer promote excessive heat and foul odors instead of decomposing, though, so use a limited quantity and build up the two-inch layer gradually. This way, the grass will decompose quickly and lend extra nitrogen to growing plants. It also creates fine humus. Use grass mulch around vegetables or fruit plants.
- Leaves: Leaves decompose pretty quickly, are plentifully available, look great, and improve soil quality. For these reasons, leaves are highly recommended as mulch. Be careful, though. Using whole leaves can create an impenetrable rain barrier, so don't layer them too thickly. You can also just play it safe and crush or chop leaves before using them as mulch. Also, avoid black walnut tree leaves, which contain juglone, a plant growth inhibitor.
- Bark and wood chips: Two or three inches of bark or wood chips provides good weed control.
Tips:
- Most organic mulches should be applied after plants are well established—around five or six inches tall.
- Get the weeds out first. Once you've weeded, spread the mulch evenly over the bare soil between the plants.
- Water before you mulch, or wait until after a rain. Then, apply your mulch before the weather turns hot.
- Compost and peat moss are also possible organic mulches, but in general are more beneficial when worked directly into the soil.
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