Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Michael Nevin <mikepnevin@yahoo.ca>]

Hi - if you can save leaves, that is good. Could you not use newspaper or cardboard as a mulch? There must be locally available materials which are: non-toxic and a disposal problem for the producer. Do you have a local garden club or horticultural society you can swap ideas with?

Cheers, Mike in Toronto

Greg Baka <g_baka2002@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Sorry if this has already been covered, but I could
> not figure out how to search the archives...
>
> My mulch has almost all broke down into soil, and
> suddenly it seems I have swapped a dependance on
> composting/fertilizing for a dependence on trucking in
> mulch...
>
> In Fall of 2005 I covered my garden space with foot of
> spoiled hay, and not loose fluffly hay but compacted
> "books" of hay, the still-compacted segments of the
> hay bales. This took multiple loads
>  of hay. Some
> things grew well in 2006 (some didn't, but that's
> another post) - but the mulch was still quite thick.
> Now it is 2007 and I only have an inch or two of mulch
> left...
>
> The soil is quite nice underneath, but the cover is
> thin enough that weeds are easily popping up through
> it.
>
> I'm in the city, so except for leaves there is not
> much mulch material readily available.
>
> So I'm wondering what sort of treadmill I have gotten
> myself onto here. I spent lots of money and time and
> effort getting all that mulch in 2005. Do I have to do
> it all over again now in 2007, and then again in 2009,
> and again in 2011, and on and on?
>
> The mulch did a great job of turning the the lawn into
> garden, and the soil seems much improved, but am I
> looking at a never-ending project and expense of
> trucking in mulch???
>
> Greg in MO
>
> "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." 
> Seneca. 3rd century
>  b.c.
>
>
>
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