permaculture

[Paul Cereghino <paul.cereghino@comcast.net>]

I getting ready for another wave of mulching in zone 1-2 areas.. 
appliance store boxes, purchased straw, local horse manure, and rock 
powders and sea weed. My source of arborist chips hasn't been coming 
through.

As i begin to plant up sheet mulched areas, I am finding that straw 
mulch seems to call for herbaceous plantings, and lends itself better to 
seeding. While woody mulch calls for woody or rhizomatous plantings or 
conifer forest understory spp. I just don't like plugging perennial 
divisions into the woody mulch because of the nitrogen issue, but 
live-staking cuttings seems fine. And infill with self seeding species 
(ever popular parsley, calendula, etc..) seems like it makes more sense 
in straw mulches compared to woody mulches. It seems like there is a 
need to align your mulch approach and your target community composition. 
Is this a pattern others have found or thought more about?... it seems 
like it might relate somehow to the distinction between moder and mull 
humus types common in soil ecology literature and perhaps whole 
associations of plants adapted to different soil carbon environments 
(lots of our local Ericaciaea (blueberry family) fruits seem to like 
woody moder soils, but most of our edibles are more field species... 
mull soils)... any thoughts for plants that like to seed into woody 
soils? (then theres mushrooms...)

Paul Cereghino
Olympia, WA