What is the BEST mulch for your garden? (Avoid the one that KILLS EVERYTHING)
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- Опубліковано 4 кві 2023
- Which mulch is best for your garden? Today we cover the options, and share how you can keep your garden from getting wiped out.
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Whether you're going with a Back to Eden wood chip mulch, or pine bark, or pine needles, or grass clippings, or leaf mulch... today's video is for you. We know mulch is good for the garden, yet there are many mulching options! Mulching doesn't have to be complicated. In this video I share a little about fungally dominated soil and bacterially dominated soil, hay and straw mulch, grass clippings vs. pine mulch and more... but in the end, you'll see how easy it is to mulch, and chances are you have some free mulch already available on your property. We also talk about why the Ruth Stout gardening method can now KILL YOUR GARDEN! Seriously. It's no joke. Herbicides in manure and in hay are a serious problem now, and you may have to grow your own mulch or plant a cover crop to beat it. Personally, we love sunn hemp and sudan-sorghum grass as biomass crops that give us lots of mulch and free compost. I have multiple other cheap gardening hacks in this video - thanks for watching! - Навчання та стиль
I prefer just mulching with fresh 100 dollar bills. Saves money over buying mulch at the store. 😆
I got all these pallets of hundos sitting around and I never even thought of that.
@@CBiscuit420 hahaha 💀
😂
😂
Hahahahah!
An arborist lives down the road from us. Every couple months he drives up and asks if he can still dump his woodchips and I guide him to the newest area I need chips dumped onto. It’s a great arrangement 🙂
Katie WI 5a
That is a great setup.
Ever wonder if your bringing in a tree killing fungus such as oak wilt along with those dead trees he cut down and chipped
Long as it’s not an Oak tree farm… probably not an issue.
@@supramby no
I really LOVE your sign-off❤
Cascadia OR 7a
I used wood chips and chop and drop around the yard to totally improve my soil. Big changes from a dry hard clay! Now I have worms everywhere and mushrooms popping up. My soil is much better in 3 years and it keeps getting better.
yep what you're likely doing is ua-cam.com/video/JGxSDhnvUUc/v-deo.html lots of talks on it. Completely brings soil back to life
Thanks for another great video David! Just a tip for anyone that has a free or cheap source of hay that they aren't 100% sure is glyphosate-free, they can test it first by growing a few beans in it. They are fast growing and will show signs of toxic herbicides faster than any other plant.
🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱
That's great advice! I think David has a video on that very subject.
That's what I do.
I don't have a problem with glyphosate. Years ago, I wondered about it. I had a 100 ft border around my yard and I planted sunflowers all along the border. For two years, I applied glyphosate to suppress weeds along a 50 ft section. I manually removed weeds in the remaining 50 ft, planted the seeds then mulched. The only difference I noticed was the glyphosate section was a lot less labor.
@@priayief The sunflowers will aid in remediation of the glyphosphate. The stuff David is referring to is Aminopyralid, Clopyralid, etc. Glyphosphate is the least of our worries.
Great tipp!
I read 80 pages my 1st day of compost everything! And I'm almost done reading Grow or Die. I'm addicted to the Good books. Thanks David!
Me too! Just finished Grocery Row Gardening with no gardening experience and planted my first garden! David's saying of "if it doesn't grow it wasn't meant to grow" is keeping me optimistic.
I love his writing too. Informative, interesting, and funnily witty too.
Thank you!
Grass clippings are the best, all-round mulch and mixed with leaves, builds up soil tilth pretty quickly.
Grass and leaves=black gold ! 👍
Absolutely agree!
Every single farm around here sprays grazon. It has been near impossible to find unsprayed hay but when we finally did the guy thought I was crazy for getting excited for his weedy hay.
@Ben Hollar "Hi Hollar Family! Love you guys." So sad about the spraying, glad you found a clean source. I lost a very large potted
Cherokee Purple tomato a few days after I transplanted it into a raised bed, that had tainted hay, that had rotted for at least 3 years on a compost pile.
It's horrible.
@@davidthegood all part of the Evil plan to force people to eat lab created food, or pay incredible prices for it.
Bought hay to put around my plants in the garden at a local farm supply (Interior Alaska) and it killed my garden completely. Not realizing what happened, replanted and all those plants died too. Ended up not having a garden for 2 years, the plants didn't die the next year but didn't produce anything. Had to relocate the garden and start over. Pay attention and ask questions about everything when purchasing mulch or compost.
I was lucky the first guy I asked had grown au naturel they'd just turn the field and grow beans for a year.
We love composting hardwood mulch right under our feet .. the worms love it, the fungi love it. Having that pad of super absorbent organic matter beside each planting bed captures water and nutrients that run off, so once its done composting, we can just put it right back on top of the beds. Its like a gardening cheat code.
Another great video !!
And you can inoculate it with your favorite edible fungi too.
If you're walking on it, that's decomposition - not compost.
@@DoctorMandible the end result doesn't care what you call it. 🙂 Walking on it just helps break up the material mechanically.
I recently watched a vid from a fellow called Huw in the UK who has had very nice results composting right in the pathways between his beds. Ten months ago he basically made a new thick lasagna bed in the paths - cardboard, woodchip, grass clippings etc, and just let nature take its course with very minimal turning/flipping. A few weeks ago he harvested a surprisingly impressive amount of compost, and now he's just starting again the same way as before. Excellent results with not much effort, and the compost is already right there next to the bed or row where you need it.
@@dogslobbergardens-hv2wf I watched that one too and thought it was an excellent idea
You made my day! I saw the utility guys cutting and chipping and asked if they would dump it in my yard! A they did!!!
Same ❤
It took years, but I *finally* made friends with an arborist crew that was happy to dump piles of fresh ramial woodchip on my place. I just happened to drive by and see them working, so I just stopped and asked. They also brought me a couple pickup loads of oak and maple chunks to cut up for firewood.
That chance meeting was a very, very happy day for which I am still grateful.
You were lucky! I found that the people cutting under the power lines on the road in Florida, selectively spray a number of evil, persistent chemicals in between cuttings . That stuff, turned into mulch, is what David is talking about. It will kill every kind of plant except "grass", and palmettos. I found out because I developed a rash from my well water a few weeks after the spraying. (The sprayers "didn't notice" that My well was right across the street) When I asked for a list of the spray ingredients, I found there was four different products in use! All aminopyralid.
I run cardboard through a shredder for my compost, but I get so much of it I've started using it as a mulch too. Don't judge me. 😅
I've done it, and will do it again.
@@davidthegood Judged or shredded...??? 😂
I saved some of my plants that were in too big pots to drag in my little greenhouse by mulching with shredded paper. Miniature moringa coming back from the roots! We had a 3 day cold snap below freezing here by savannah and I thought it was a goner.
@@cherylinoklahoma9624 Excellent question. 🤣
They actually sell paper mulch now and potting soil, its called pitt moss. It's a company out of Pittsburgh. Wish it was more widely available. Seen it on a recent YT video
I have Oregano under my Apple tree for 3 years now, perfect.
Really? I happen to have an apple tree and oregano that I need to get out of a pot
I mulch with the pages of gardening books that are inferior to the books written by David the Good
A+++ comment
This guy, composting someone else’s enemies.
@Christopher Pisz: 😂😂😂 Hope you're not spending much (or any) money aquiring those inferior publications, and thank you for "taking out the trash" 😊
🤣❤️
A local, to me, mushroom farm sells their spent medium as compost, the medium they use is wheat straw.
When I asked on their FB page if the straw had been treated with glyphosate, my comment was deleted, and I never got a response.
I'm curious how much of the glyphosate is taken up by the mushrooms they grow.
Anyway, great video and great job making people aware of potential hazards.
I wondered about that too! One mushroom grower in Florida is using rice, on shelves, lots of different things going on, we need to know!
Yeah, it can have Grazon in it too. They sometimes add manure.
To cheaply test the mushroom compost before you buy a whole load.
Buy a small amount and plant green bean seeds in cups. Inspect for 2 weeks and if they are healthy you are good to go. Any damage to green beans makes it questionable.
That's a scary thought.
Good friends help you move Really good friends help you move your wood chip pile😂
I agree. One of my best friends volunteered.
I'm planting a truckload of comfrey around my property this year. I plan on having enough comfrey and grass clippings to mulch every garden around lol. I have a 2 acre yard so I got tons of room to grow biomass. I collect tons of fallen leaves from the forest behind my house and then rake up tons of leaf mold from under the leaves. I have 2 compost bins made of pallets that are full of crumbly leaf mold and one full of compost from last year. I'm going all out this year on my gardens. I buried fish scraps and kitchen scraps in my garden rows all winter also. The amount of big ol fat worms in my garden now is amazing. My daughter caught like 20 from a hole six inches in diameter and property 8 inches deep. They've had about 8 inches of leaves on them since I harvested last fall. I'm not gonna compost much this year. I'm just going to mulch heavy and bury what I don't mulch with in the garden rows.
That's awesome.
@David The Good THE more organic matter the better. No such thing as too much unless you pile up a bunch of fresh green grass or something and get it hot.
@@skinnyWHITEgoyim A few years ago I bought six pieces of Bocking 14 comfrey root. Long story short, it has been the single most rewarding investment I ever made. I have now lost count of how many comfrey plants I have, and I sell some to others to get them started.
Speaking of leaves from the forest (kind of), my favorite "kickstarter" for compost or soil mix is the gorgeous black, rich humus found under an old stump.
I started with Russian Bocking 14 and love it for a fertilizing mulch and making a fertilizer tea. It also flowers so it’s good for the bees. If you have livestock you can use it for feed. I use it in making medicinal salves. I’ve planted it next to elderberry trees, a fig tree and a peach tree, and put a few in my garden. This variety does not spread unless you divide it. Such a valuable plant! This year I’ve grown some common comfrey, which does spread, from seed. (My bocking 14 was from root cuttings.) I have an area perfect for it which was formerly overgrown with English Ivy (ugh!!!!! Still fighting it.) If that area gets completely covered in comfrey I will be a happy Gardner!
@@debrabailey255we have the bocking as well and it seems the hummingbirds like it.
We got the because we were told it was invasive and we have a small yard, but I've just done some more reading about our area because we may be getting some land, and there are no warnings against it, so I'll be getting the self seeding variety if we move 🙂
There are four known persistent herbicides:
Picloram (Dow AgroSciences, 1957),
Clopyralid (Dow AgroSciences, 1987,
Aminopyralid (Dow AgroSciences, 2005) and
Aminocyclopyrachlor (DuPont, 2010).
There are more than 150 retail products in the U.S.
but these chemicals may appear on labels in slightly different variations
making identification difficult.
This is excellent - thank you!
Thanks for this! Just what I needed to hear, I get caught up watching gardening videos and then thinking I need just the right things to make this work. Thanks for keeping things down to earth, affordable and simple.
You bet.
Ya bro, just a lil thinking
never say die+pragmatism shows the solutions can be free and all around you. Good show dood.
Oak leaves and a mulching mower work wonders. Mulch them small like coffee grounds by passing on them a bunch. Black gold.
I'm impressed with your bravery, walking around barefoot on all those mulch piles. In my mulch, they're teeming with centipedes, ants, and sandsharks. I have to wear socks and shoes and do 'the shuffle', never leaving one foot planted more than a second or two.
I sifted my wood chips and started all my seeds this year in it.
Like you hit "refresh"; you are back, better than ever, and highlighting all the resources we have at hand instead of $$$. Love it!
Thank you
South Carolina. Pine Straw… EVERYWHERE!!!! I also planted Winter Wheat as a cover crop this past fall and it’s been perfect to add to the row gardens (Wheat is my pathways) and it’s conviniently next to my Swamp Water😂😂😂
I live in a town with maple tree lined streets. The leaves are an abundant free resource in the fall. Driving around on garbage day you can find 20 or more bags of them. I use it for mulch and two years ago I started making leaf mold because of watching videos about aminopyralid (persistent herbicide) tainted hay and compost in gardens. Well the first year I didnt make enough leaf mold. I mainly do container gardening and had a few 5 gallon sips left to amend when I ran out, so I bought some compost. It was contaminated. The tomato plants twisted and distorted. In the fall I built two 5'x5'x5' bins out of pallets for leaf mold. Never again. At least my problem was confined in a few 5 gallon buckets, and only killed 1 of the 4 varieties of tomato I grew. Lesson learned.
Yikes. People keep sharing these stories. The composting facilities should know better.
My garden was contaminated with " garden mix compost " that I purchased. It has taken 3 full years and more labor and ammendments than I care to mention to clear it out. I pray my garden is finally healed this season!!
@@Katydidit I hope the nightmare ends for you.
Oh man.
You can always use wild hay. Our area is full of lowland hay leases that many farmers take advantage of, and even fresh bales are very cheap. I guess we're lucky.
I have some in my Neighborhood and a 1/4 mile down the County Road the area is far to small to spray with chemicals it would cost more to spray than it's worth and I keep a very close eye on the property at all times and it's totally organic !
Its hard staying organic, I'm using my cover crop this year, planted a strip of alfalfa. Seeing a huge change in the garden this year, its the first year to bust out of the raised beds and go to in ground row gardening.
Thank you David!
Started a worm farm also.
Some areas in the country may work for raised beds, but North central Texas gets hot and dry quick, anything up above ground burns up, including the gardner😅
Great work. Worms and alfalfa are both excellent soil fixers.
I use tree company mulch in the paths and mowed oak leaves in my beds. The leaves do fantastic. Break down nice. Don’t seem to suck up nitrogen. Don’t have many weed seeds in them. Mowing them to chop them up is important. Whole leaves will either blow away or mat down.
I'm using the matting properties to keep excess rain out of the compost. No more stinky soggy heap!
I fill the bottoms of my big containers with them
We feed the birds sunflower seeds over the winter. I hang the feeder over a big tray to catch the shells. I till about 8 gallons of shells into the garden every spring. They break down fast and really appear to feed the soil well.
I am a persistent herbacide victim of giant proportions. I have 1 acre. Orchard in the front... garden beds and septic field in the back. I used to do "strawbale gardening" and I loved it... there was nothing I couldn't grow in a conditioned rotting strawbale until the one time I got treated strawbales labled organic. $7/bale 120 bale set up covering nearly my entire growing space. I paid over $900 to kill my garden space for 4 years. People say "they don't spray straw only hay!" Oh... but they do. This year I'm going through the expense of building 32" high metal and wood raised beds. It's about $450 for the materials to build an 8'x4' and a 12'x4' bed. I have spondylitis so I don't bend well... that's why I loved strawbale gardening so much. It takes about a 1/2 of a tree's tree's worth of logs and branches to fill the bottoms of 2... and 10 tonnes of Top soil and 24 bags of organic compost (tested) to fill them. We will have 5 of each size and 4 4x4' beds in between. All in all its going to cost $1000 per month for 5 months to build a useable garden space that will feed my family and keep the root systems of those plants away from the poisoned ground. The only areas that weren't poisoned are now low beds for tall and heavy sprawling crops like corn, okra, sunflower, melons and winter squash. We had to move things to get to unpoisoned ground. The EPA, FDA, CPA... they all know and continue to "discuss the situation" and do nothing. Proving, once again, the uselessness of government to do anything but steal your money. Right or left doesn't matter... poisons are bad is something every human should agree on.
This is incredible bad. And yes, right/left doesn't matter. They are all owned.
My favorite mulch is pine straw, hands down
Love it too. Pine woodchips too
I compost my chicken bedding over 4-6 months. Pretty much apply compost once a month and the bits of left over chicken bedding, now sanitized, mulch very well and break down nicely over time. Usually a mix of oak leaves, the bedding, sticks, random chunks of wood, peanut shells, bits of egg shells chopped up sunflower stems. Stuff like that and the plants love it.
I use cypress mulch in my pathways,but that is just my preference. It helps to deter bugs,ECT. They don't seem to like it.🤗
Tisk Tisk, cypress isn't sustainable.
@@inchristalone25 I don't cut and shred it myself.🤣
I dunno, there is tons of cypress around here.
Love Cypress mulch for deterring bugs! Every year I look at my Cypress and think... one fine day!!
Cedar works that way too. Deters slugs pretty well.
I like to tell people that I love Junk Mail. It's the 'deer in the headlights' look from them that makes me smile. 🙂 I take the junk mail and either use it as a base weed barrier under chips/grass clippings, or I shread it and spread it sparingly in my large compost bins for the carbon content. Win ... win.
My only issue with using junk mail, bills etc is picking out all the glossy stuff and those annoying little plastic windows on some envelopes.
@@dogslobbergardens-hv2wf Agreed!
@@dogslobbergardens-hv2wf And staples!😮
I just started working for a tree service so now I can get as many loads of wood chips as I want!
SCORE
I shred brown paper bags, paper packing, boxes, non glossy paper, thru an old paper shredder and use it for chicken coop bedding, rabbit bedding, mulch....
I work in a wood shop so my mulch is planer shavings. Mostly maple. Free and abundant, everything gets covered in planer shavings. It is heavy carbon so I try not to turn much into veggie gardens.
Question for you, do you use plywood shavings, or only solid wood shavings? There is a cabinet shop near me with an abundance of shavings, but I worry about the glue from the plywood. I’ve thought about composting it, or just using for paths. What are your thoughts? TIA
@@kamaliancirranoush1916I would def avoid plywood in the garden and compost piles. The most common glue used in plywood is made of urea and formaldehyde.
Perhaps if you bring the cabinet makers a box of donuts or something, they'd be willing let you know when they're working strictly with normal solid wood so you can come get the shavings.
DAVE ! I Really appreciate you and your time - THANK YOU!
Thank you, Stephen.
Great tips, thanks David!
Free and safe hay: I cut mine from areas that were cleared for new stores and fast food joints. These places tend to get cleared then sit for 1 to 3 years waiting to be sold, all the while tons of tall grass grows up. As long as it's not fenced off, I go in during the winter and scythe it all up.
That is epic.
I fed my horse hay. She passed in 2018. Should the poop be okay now to use as mulch?
He knows his stuff Ty David
Thank you for this! It was so enjoyable and interesting and enlightening. To me, this is one of your best. I have been watching you for many years, (thanks to Herrick at Planet Whizbang). I stopped the video to thank GOD for blessing your family with this wonderful property and now blessing all of us who watch and learn as you develop YOUR homestead. Your books are great and very affordable. I have all except the ones pertaining to Florida. Thank you again, and GOD bless you all. (Your Sisters are so funny 😂)
Thank you. It's good to see you again.
The first thing I want to say is.... wait, why should I telegraph what I'm about to say??? I love this dude. Compost your enemies😅
I used straw from TSC for chicken bedding, deep litter style. Well, after adding compost to garden, plants barely produced any food at all for 3 years. Im just now getting my soil microbes back.
Love the chop and drop method, gives so much back👍👍👍
Excellent video. Thank you.
Left for work in Tennessee for almost a year and now that I’m back I’m mulching the watermelons with all the weeds and cardboard from moving
Beyond meat is super cheap now. Would that be safe to use as mulch?
😂 good one!
@@Disabled.Megatron Yes I know. Plus more estrogen than a man should have in a lifetime. Oh and grown from cancer cells. Yummy
I love the simplicity of your message. Been watching you for years and have “most” of your books. I grew up with growing in a farming family and use and agree with your practices. I refer you to all gardening newbies. Growing food, and even pretty stuff, shouldn’t be expensive.
Thank you, Charlene.
"Think of your lawn as a reservoir of fertility." Well said.
Back in 2010 in Whatcom County, Washington, we had a real problem with aminopyralid, which is a broadleaf herbicide used on hayfields. It went through the cow and through the compost that was sold as organic and killed beans, tomatoes, etc. The local food co-op in Bellingham did not restrict organic suppliers who used the compost because, "They followed the rules for organic certification." The local WSU extension agents said that organic growers who used the compost should not lose their certification because, "They followed the rules for organic certification." Of course, neither the co-op nor WSU even addressed the possibility of contamination in the milk produced from this farm. One of the more egregious scandals I saw back in Washington before I left.
It's really ridiculous. I remember hearing about some of that.
Been using grass clippings for years. It is an essential part of my gardening
Same!
Great video. Thanks for the info - I need to mulch.
Thanks for teaching & entertaining 😅 great info!
Great video, as usual!
Hi David!! Good to see you!
You too, Julie.
Thanks for all u do n thanks for the infor Many blessings from North Texas❤
This herbicide is absolutely devastating! And it is being widely used. Thanks for letting people know about aminopyralid! We found out the hard way and it destroyed our garden for years because we don't get much rain where we live.
It's wretched. And all the gardening books still say "manure is a great amendment..." without warnings. We shouldn't have to worry about this stuff!!!
I believe it is illegal in Europe
So does this mean the Moo-Nure I purchased which is supposed to be organic compost with manure is poisoning my garden?
Thank you for the info David. I have recently gotten about 20 yards of wood chips from the free chip drop. I am using them around my trees, and pathways that I'm building. And, I'm composting a lot as well. In the late winter I emptied my Spring/summer 2022 compost bin that wasn't fully composted into my garden bed prep, and that had a ton of grass clippings from the last mowing. I'm growing more comfrey for chop and drop this year, and I'm fascinated with the Sun Hemp approach!! Your information is so important. Don't stop!!! XOXOXO
I created a mulch from my humus collecting from places where I am putting in a pond and a driveway. I cleared the brush and removing humus from the the thick root zone above the sand. I have this left over product of root balls. So I started mulching around my passion fruit (growing to make a shade only carport). I am hoping the roots have good bacterias that will was down into my passion fruit root zone as well as shade the ground and slowly decompose. Meanwhile I am removing the humus and roots from places where it would be troublesome for under a driveway or pond liner. Hope it turns out to make a decent mulch
When you threw that little fit I immediately subscribed lol love your stuff so far.
Welcome
I love grass mulch. Love your videos
Woohoo 🎉 I got my first taste of honey berry today. My four plants haven't produced in the past 2 years but one made it through the frost this year and is making a handful of fruit. Tastes like a tart grape to me. I also got apple and nectarine seeds to grow nicely and am starting the grocery row method ❤
Thank you again another good show
Stew Peters Interview: Nanotech found in Grocery Store Meat
Ana Maria Mihalcea, MD, PhD
Apr 5
We're definitely all going to die.
Good explanation about the problems with hay!
Thank you. Good to see you.
Good job!
Your comments are just as adamant as mine!
This is the way the gardeners should see it , good choice making this particular video that’s why I subscribed!
Because feeding us the reality of what it is, is truly what it is!
I’m so excited because the power company was doing some major trimming in our neighborhood this week and I thought to ask for the chips!
I have a lot of green stripe golden Hawaiian bamboo. There's a constant leaf fall has made the best mulch I've ever used.
I can also run the leaves over with my mower, and it becomes better than Peet moss for trapping moisture and giving a slower drain.
That is awesome!! We used to get Bambusa vulgaris leaves in big piles in the tropics.
@David The Good here in your old stomping grounds of Florida, (Clearwater) I've been propagating them like crazy. Bamboo is my favorite ... my only issue is they grow so large, so fast. Last fall, prior to hurricanes, they were coming out at 6"-8" diameters and growing to 20ft in less than a month. But then, a good heavy wind breaks them. Hurricane demolished them. I'm going to try watering less in hopes they can grow a bit slower, and stronger... but not sure if it will work. Add a bit of borax or shellac to water maybe ??? 🤣 🤣 🤣
Amazing timing, as always! My cukes could use some mulch. I've been waiting for Chipdrop for 3 months but I have a ton of grass to cut.
Agree totally with David. In particular, the part about persistent pesticide. I mixed about 2 l of my urine in the standard 1cu m compost as a starter. Composted for about 2 months till temperature dropped to ambient. Applied the compost to my plants and they showed the typical crinkling of leaves, lack of fruit, reduced growth, etc after a few wks. Plants most affected were papaya, tomato, and several broad leaf weeds. Deadly gift from the herbicide companies!
Lipomyces cononencoa is a type of yeast which supposedly will break down the grazon. Back in 2020, a biologist who was a commenter on David's forum gave us this info. after we were discussing the problem.
Just makes sense to use wood chips with perennials where they have time to process long term. My neighbor gave me his grass clippings. He doesn't spray anything. And due to the erratic crazy weather trees have been dropping leaves all year so there's plenty of leaves.The grass to me is great for making fertilizer tea. Gonna start that this year, while expanding compost for my tiny garden. I did start some comfort last year for the plant feeding too.
Fantastic video. I do the same with my grass. Circle mow. Ugh with the hay. 😞
Thank you David
You’re great!!! I’m loving binge watching your videos.
Greetings from DownUnder 🤗
I’m experimenting with sewing, my pathways with a mix of white clover , alfalfa, and vetch and arugula The white clover and vetch and alfalfa are nitrogen fixers I then mow the paths and they add nitrogen into the soils ton feed the beds each side
I love those types of seed mixes - good luck.
Around here hardly anyone sprays hay but if you look at their pastures it is easy to tell.
Great video! I've been using grass clippings for years in my garden. I would add one thing, rocks. It's great for pathways and can look sharp around ornamentals (and the deer seem to hate it!)
I tried to use larger Moringa branch cuttings under my soil, but it is like a Frankenstein branch. So I maybe need to rent a mulcher for when we start over with that tree because I think my soil would love it! (Got a fence after planting the Moringa). Would love a paw paw tree, or Mango that does not get fire blight. Like the idea of cover crop!
Well that free bail of hay I got for my garden is going straight to the fire pit! Thanks David ❤
I threw lentils from Walmart on some beds- really pretty as a cover crop
It was so awesome meeting you & your family this past weekend! Your son playing the guitar is such a super cool kid! I wish we all could've hung out longer, but i was so distracted by all the cool stuff around & I didn't want to bug ya too much 😂 While being distracted, i forgot to ask your son what kind of cucumbers were in the pack i got from you guys 🤔 it was the package titled " Ezekiel's crazy cukes" i think?
God bless you all & I can't wait to meet yall again 🤗💕🫂
Those are watermelons. Good meeting you too!
I've started most of those and notice a huge improvement in soil. I've even used paper shreds
Me too.
Straw is my perfect vegetable garden mulch, although the snakes love my mulch too. I'm here in Central sunny Florida, I really love your utube videos😊
I literally just did this the last two days. Asked the hubby not to mow since the lawn came back alive, and now have more free mulch than I can use. You've been such an inspiration, thank you.
Thank you.
I chop and drop since years and it works great.
Great video
I bought a bag of potting mix at Walmart this year and was shocked that the seedlings struggled in it and died. First time to experience that! I will use the organic bag for now on. Great video!
It is crazy how bad things are getting
I have been using grass clippings for many years. It is an amazing thing to use. When I moved to my new house, I got a gardener who mowed my lawn and my vegetable garden suffered terribly. I decided to have the gardener mow the front lawn only and I do the back so I can scoop up the grass and use it again. He would not scoop it up so I had to. My garden is recovering and my plants are beautiful. I never have weeds since I pile it on pretty thick... one thing only use grass from an organic lawn if you are growing food.
Glad my dad bales his own hay. I only have to ask two or three times to know it's clean.
Great one! Sad I missed my 2 favorite YT guys at the festival. Unable to go.
I let my yard re-wild this spring to use as green mulch. My husband hated it but I have used every bit and I cut some daily to throw to our chickens too.
The birds and bees and all of nature thank you
Great information, I have just subscribed to your site. Thank you for you for your knowledge and time...Alf🙂🙂🙂🙂
Thank you. Welcome!
I started doing all of my gardening barefoot since finding your channel lol. Feels great to feel the earth.
Nice, Eric. It seems to boost energy.
Good grounding!
Thanks David
Thanks for the tip on using weeds!!! I don't have any grass but I do have weeds !
I have a 5 Gal Bucket Garden and I will use Straw to Mulch and Seaweed to Fertilize ... so far so good
Thank you so much!
We live in SW Arizona - just Desert - no grass. We have to buy hay & alfalfa hay to use for mulch. We used to get wood chips but we had to load it ourselves & since we are in our late 70s -we are unable to do that anymore. Will be using cardboard & the straw. Yes we also use weeds under the cardboard. Thank you.
my best year in my annual garden was when I took my fall leaves the fall before into my garden and planted directly into it in the spring. It was a complete jungle garden that year. They had all winter to start breaking down, but still had enough to hold moisture the next year. Only downfall is that it brought in a bunch of poke seeds and a few tree nuts... Not a huge problem, just annoying when poke and trees was growing where I didn't want it.
Oh wait, I'm supposed to avoid the one that kills all my plants?! So that's what I've been doing wrong this whole time! Hahaha, I love your sense of humor in these videos, and how you show that it just really doesn't always work out perfectly. Thanks for sharing all of these!
Thanks, Kira.
Absolutely right about that bad hay! A few years ago, we got loads of aged manure from a local-ish dairy farm and tilled it into the garden spot. It killed everything that we put in the garden that year. It took us a while to figure out what was going on and some investigating to find out that the hay had been sprayed with that toxic poison. Not only our garden but the gardens of three other families that we shared that manure with were killed. Hard lesson learned there for all of us. I can't help but wonder about those dairy products....
David the Good, I like your hat a lot (this sun is brutal and feels 'stronger' than it used to be years ago?); where can we find hats like yours??
Thanks so much for all of your knowledgeable videos.
Best wishes!!
I am so sorry. I got this hat from Tractor Supply, I think.
Sometimes I use a tool called a grass whip to cut weeds and long wet grass for mulch. It looks and swings like a golf club and has a two-sided serated head so works with a forehand and back
-handed stroke.