Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Harvey Ussery <huboxwood@earthlink.net>]

> The power company is cutting lots of oaks and a few pines and things out
> back along a long stretch. I'm having them dump a bunch of it (at least 6
> big loads) and will be using it partly to cover a lot of the grass in the
> front yard, and just as general organic matter added in all over.
>
> My questions are:
> 1. I have noticed how quickly everything breaks down here, but how thick
> should we spread the mulch if we want to kill the grass? We're taking back
> our lawn. I see quotes like 4" and 6" deep, and am thinking of maybe putting
> cardboard or newspaper under parts of it, especially where we want to make
> permanent pathways.

I like the cardboard/newspaper--that's how I've been putting down my 
"kill mulches" in my emergent forest garden, whether in the main areas 
themselves (where I've used everything from pony poop/stable bedding to 
chips to litter from the poultry house to lawn clippings over 
cardboard/newspaper) or to establish the pathways (maybe 4" over 
cardboard/newspaper). As for how much: far's I know, it's one of those 
situations where the answer is "How much you got?" The deeper the 
better, I think. Some really tough plants (violets, plantain, etc.) come 
up thru such a kill mulch anyway--I'm laying down a second application 
some places. Once the roots are exhausted, your mulched area should be 
free from such incursions, and subject only to blown-in seeds.

> 2. If I put wood chips on growing beds, will it pull nitrogen from the soil?

You see all sorts of answers to this, from "emphatically yes!" to "only 
if you mix the wood into the soil." I lean to the latter. I've had 
experience, though, where incorporation of woody material (including oak 
leaves) in the soil had disastrous growth-suppressing effect a whole 
season. Also, have had experience where fresh woodchips used as a mulch 
close around estab'd plantings didn't seem to do the plants any good. 
Might be better to let them age awhile before using close around 
existing plants. If using for pathways, not an issue.

By the way, everybody: Cannot recommend strongly enough Paul Stamets's 
new book MYCELIUM RUNNING. (Stamets is the big mushroom guru out in 
Washington state--also THE MUSHROOM CULTIVATOR, GROWING GOURMET AND 
MEDICINAL MUSHROOMS, a book on the psilocybes, etc.) My head is buzzing 
with exciting possibilities. Forget "recycling" if it means separating 
out newspaper and cardboard and sending them off to recycling streams 
elsewhere--they can very well be recycled right on your own place using 
a number of edible mushrooms which eat anything based on wood pulp for 
breakfast. And those coarse woody things like rosemary trimmings, tree 
prunings, oak leaves, etc. that are difficult to break down in the 
compost heap, thus the temptation to send them off to the landfill? Do 
not despair--there are species, Lepista nuda (blewitt--a prized edible 
species) prominent among them, which *love* "complex debris piles" like 
the above, plus grass clippings.

Wood chips are a gold mine for the potential mushroom cultivator--there 
are many useful species which utilize them well, breaking them down into 
new soil. Out in Stamets's area, it is well known that the best place to 
look for psilocybes is areas that have been mulched with wood chips or 
"beauty bark." I've seen a similar occurrence here: I laid down several 
heavy applications of woodchips as mulch, and in two of them I've gotten 
spontaneous fruitings of Stropharia rugoso-annulata (King or Wine-cap 
Stropharia, a choice edible), though I had never seen any on my property 
before.

The potential for using mushrooms for decomposing/recycling/reclaiming 
are enormous. Check out the book.

~Harvey

--
Harvey in northern Va
www.themodernhomestead.us

"The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal 
is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of 
unforeseeable and uncontrollable events."  (Winston Churchill)