Mulching with compost in established bed
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Establishing new perennial beds
Comments (13)mitanoff: Where my existing soil is okay, I sometimes just use cardboard to kill the grass, coffee grounds to attract earthworms & any lawn clippings and/or leaves I might have on hand, before covering it all with mulch (optional) and waiting for the grass to die. With enough moisture & time, the cardboard will decompose and then you can dig & plant. If your soil is poor or rocky, the higher you build your lasagna layers the better, allowing you to plant without having to dig into the original soil. Twelve inches could easily compress to only a couple of inches by spring. This time of year you should be able to find lots of leaves to use as browns. Alfalfa pellets from a feed store can be used as a green, if you don't have access to other greens. I'm not familiar with triple mix, so can't comment on that. Suzanne: If you aren't going to plant anything immediately (Some lasagna gardeners do), using your slightly aged manure should be okay. I would think you could continue adding stuff as you want, keeping in mind that it does take time for things to breakdown. This is a very forgiving process. As long as everything you use is compostable, it will break down given enough time....See MoreWhen to compost/ mulch?
Comments (6)"Mulch" is anything applied to the top of the soil for various purposes, weed suppression being only one. Many folks mulch with whatever they have at hand - grass clippings, shredded leaves, wood chips from the local utility/tree trimming crew, etc. And there's no reason you can't save yourself a step and mulch with compost, yours if you have it or purchased if you don't. I only use compost as a mulch throughout my garden - adds to soil texture and fertility (never need to fertilize), conserves moisture, insulates against temperature swings and suppresses weeds. And it looks good. It does breakdown or shrink faster than some other mulches but I don't consider that to be a significant disadvantage. I typically spread the compost twice a year (spring and fall) but you could get by with only once. Less than 2 inches of mulch is a waste of time and more than 4 inches is excessive. And look into bulk soil providers - purchasing compost or any other type of mulch or soil amendment in bags is very expensive. Bulk purchases will run a fraction of the cost of bagged....See MoreHas anyone used gromax as mulch...is it the same as compost mulch
Comments (2)Not familiar with a product named Gromax but I agree that not all wood chip mulch will automatically come infected with the fungus spores - right out of the bag. And even if it is already contaminated with the spores due to improper aging/composting and storage it can be eliminated by drying the mulch well first in the sun before applying it. But the fungus is air born too so, if common to the area, it can arrive on the wind and set up housekeeping. It only thrives in ideal conditions - very warm, always moist environment, shaded, limited air circulation area, and within a narrow range of pH. Correct the problems that are encouraging it's growth keeps it from coming back. The article below should be of help to you. Dave Here is a link that might be useful: Control of Nuisance Fungi...See Morecollecting worms from an established compost heap
Comments (4)Based upon others experiences as well as my own (relative newbie) with a bin, I would use something other than onion as bait. For whatever reason the onions seem to be ignored by worms until most anything else is consumed. What do you want the worms for? Starting a bin or something else? If for something else your idea should work fine, just use a bait more attractive to worms like... well, most anything other than onions ;-) Probably avoid really acid stuff like citrus fruit as well. Most anything else that is rotting should work great. If you wish to start your own bin you should be fine if it is an outdoor bin, but if indoors you may want to buy EF redworms as these are regarded as the most bin friendly. There are other redworms out there, but don't adjust to bin life quite as well. Some even have a tendency to be all happy for awhile and then one day decide to move on which as I am sure you can imagine leaves a mess on the floor ;-) Might work OK though, don't know. Just depends....See Moremazerolm_3a
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