North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Melissa Kacalanos <mijwiz@yahoo.com>]

Evan,

I'm sorry I don't have direct experience with this, as I live in one of those 
places with lots of free leaves. I'm wondering what your rural area is like 
exactly. Are there farms? What do they grow? I'm guessing they produce some 
sort of waste product that might fit your mulch needs if you asked around.

As for growing your own mulch, I wonder if a nitrogen-fixing legume, maybe 
interplanted with a grass, would produce mulch faster than trees.

Melissa

--- On Tue, 3/23/10, Evan <kodama@riseup.net> wrote:

> From: Evan <kodama@riseup.net>
> Subject: [NAFEX] Growing Mulch
> To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
> Date: Tuesday, March 23, 2010, 10:53 AM
> This may be a silly question, but as
> I've begun planting and planning  
> my modest orchard, I've run into a lack of available
> mulching  
> materials (or more likely, I'm just blind to what's staring
> me in the  
> face). The orchard's in a rural area and there aren't the
> abundant  
> flows of woodchips and leaf-litter found in the urban
> areas. But, in  
> consideration of a future with much less energy to spend
> on  
> woodchippers, I've been wondering what I could use for
> mulch.
> 
> Right now I'm thinking I'll plant a coppice-or-pollard
> field  
> downslope where I can take the shoots and lay as mulch
> around some of  
> my fruit and nut trees upslope. I'm not sure which species
> I'll use,  
> but possibly a mix of Basswood, Black Birch and maybe even
> Willow. My  
> thinking is that if I coppice or pollard them on a fairly
> regular  
> basis I can have a good supply of small woody shoots that
> will act as  
> a decent mulch, break down relatively quickly and possibly
> enrich the  
> nutrient content of the soils around my food-trees (I think
> Black  
> Birch accumulates K, P, and Ca; Tilia P and Ca). I guess
> I'm  
> wondering if anyone has experience with this sort of thing,
> what  
> species you use, and how it works.
> 
> In case it's relevant the orchard is/will-be comprised of
> primarily  
> Hazels, Chestnuts, Crabapples, and Juneberries.
> 
> Or maybe there's blindspot I have and this isn't a good
> idea?
> 
> Thanks!
> Evan