A few weeks ago, I was working in the garden, getting the garden beds ready for a thick planting of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, squashes, peas, beans, etc. I was working compost into the beds and thought that I wished I knew of a good, cheap source of mulch for the beds. Every source I'd found was too expensive for my tastes. I'd thought about rounding up all of the neighbors' yard waste and spending the $100 to rent a wood chipper for a day. Then it hit me.
When we moved in, there was a large tree stump that we knocked over while cleaning up the tree line. It had sat outside through two winters, at least. I stepped on it. My foot caved into the fluffiest, softest, most beautiful mulch I'd ever seen. I was easily able to break apart almost all of it by hand. The few pieces that weren't able to be broken apart easily were tossed aside. When I dig my next garden bed, I'll bury those pieces in the bottom to continue decomposing and improving my clay soil.
The stump was huge and I was able to mulch 2 1/2 out of 4 beds for free. This is a good reminder that I should look for ways to repurpose or reuse items around the stead before considering buying something I need.
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Wow, glad you found a free source for your mulch.
ReplyDeleteGod bless.
I'm guilty of not looking at what I have that I could use, too. It is a good reminder to look at home first!
ReplyDeleteI use leaves from my home, the neighbors and I also use grass clippings from our unfertilized (except by chickens) yard. I spread about 2" around every week on all my beds and they are the easiest to weed beds I've ever had and the stuff growing is growing so well due to the breakdown of the clippings. bonus, they dry and age to a lovely yellow that looks great against the green grass.. yep, I am a hidden gardener, my veggie beds are in the front yard and admired for the "pretty flower arrangements" by my neighbors. The chickens are in the backyard where they can't eat everything.
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