H.O.W. Foundation

[heironymouspasparagus]

That kind of built up wall is about the only thing I haven't tried for raised bed.  Probably work well, but expensive and takes up a little extra room.  I have a retaining wall in back that could almost be considered raised bed - about 18", and it works nicely.  Used concrete decorative retaining wall blocks for it, glued the top level on with concrete adhesive caulk and it is still doing well after about 15 years.  Lower levels interlock to hold in place.

Mulch -
Well, here I go again.  Notice; I am probably gonna piss off everyone, but ANY kind of wood as mulch is INSANE!!!  When a tree is cut, the best parts go to make lumber.  The shorter good to medium to poor go to make firewood.  The leftover diseased, insect ridden, debris is used to make mulch.  (Cypress is the least problematic just because bugs like it less and disease is a little more scarce, too.)  Pine bark mulch in particular, while not shredded wood, it HUGE problem.  Always an ant hill in every bag.  And notice all the dead and dying pines around?  There is a nematode that is killing them, so you will always get a good selection of nematodes.  

Keep any wood AWAY from the house NO MATTER WHAT - if you put wood mulch around the house, at the footing, you are laying out a termite buffet!  (Very bad personal experience here - can show pictures of interior wall torn out to repair.)

Cottonseed burr (shell of seed) makes a great mulch.  Use compost.  Composted manure.  Even use hay if you can stand the look of it (needless to say, I love the stuff.  The seeds - weeds - that do come up are easy to pull.)  Never wood!

Oh, and by the way - before I forget - never wood!

[rdj]

Have you ever used pine straw mulch?  I was at Hardscape materials in Bixby looking at rocks and saw they sold it.  I've heard its good for acid loving plants but never used it.

[HoneySuckle]

That kind of built up wall is about the only thing I haven't tried for raised bed.  Probably work well, but expensive and takes up a little extra room.  I have a retaining wall in back that could almost be considered raised bed - about 18", and it works nicely.  Used concrete decorative retaining wall blocks for it, glued the top level on with concrete adhesive caulk and it is still doing well after about 15 years.  Lower levels interlock to hold in place.

Mulch -
Well, here I go again.  Notice; I am probably gonna piss off everyone, but ANY kind of wood as mulch is INSANE!!!  When a tree is cut, the best parts go to make lumber.  The shorter good to medium to poor go to make firewood.  The leftover diseased, insect ridden, debris is used to make mulch.  (Cypress is the least problematic just because bugs like it less and disease is a little more scarce, too.)  Pine bark mulch in particular, while not shredded wood, it HUGE problem.  Always an ant hill in every bag.  And notice all the dead and dying pines around?  There is a nematode that is killing them, so you will always get a good selection of nematodes.  

Keep any wood AWAY from the house NO MATTER WHAT - if you put wood mulch around the house, at the footing, you are laying out a termite buffet!  (Very bad personal experience here - can show pictures of interior wall torn out to repair.)

Cottonseed burr (shell of seed) makes a great mulch.  Use compost.  Composted manure.  Even use hay if you can stand the look of it

Don't they treat the mulch to make sure it isn't insect laiden before selling???  Oh well.  All landscape companies said they were going to use cyprus mulch, but I don't want termites too close to my home.  Thanks for the info on the cyprus blend.  I would never have known what that meant.

Not sure how I feel about hay

[heironymouspasparagus]

Hay is an acquired taste aesthetically... I like the looks pretty good, because of what it means to my gardens.  I will get a bale of old rotten hay if available.  If I have to buy new, will set it in the corner for a year to let it decompose for a while.   What works really well is to get it in fall, for fall yard decoration.  Put pumpkins, scarecrow,...all that foo-foo crap on it for the fall season.  (You do seasonal decoration, don't you?)

After that, it is winter - just let it sit.  Then in EARLY spring, like Feb, Mar, spread the rotten stuff around.  Blends in better than just putting that golden bale of hay around.  My opinion;  rotten hay is the look that people are really looking for - the "natural" look - when they put mulch.  They just want it 'manicured'.  And hay ain't manicured.  It does settle nicely for a good kind of rustic look, though.

Keep it away from house, too.  Not too much can go close to house without causing problems.  Composted manure is ok.  Cottonseed burr is probably ok.  All other organics - potential catastrophe.

No, they don't check for bugs.  Or spray the stuff.  Would you really want all those toxics where your friends, family, kids are gonna be??

[HoneySuckle]

Hay is an acquired taste aesthetically... I like the looks pretty good, because of what it means to my gardens.  I will get a bale of old rotten hay if available.  If I have to buy new, will set it in the corner for a year to let it decompose for a while.   What works really well is to get it in fall, for fall yard decoration.  Put pumpkins, scarecrow,...all that foo-foo crap on it for the fall season.  (You do seasonal decoration, don't you?)

After that, it is winter - just let it sit.  Then in EARLY spring, like Feb, Mar, spread the rotten stuff around.  Blends in better than just putting that golden bale of hay around.  My opinion;  rotten hay is the look that people are really looking for - the "natural" look - when they put mulch.  They just want it 'manicured'.  And hay ain't manicured.  It does settle nicely for a good kind of rustic look, though.

Keep it away from house, too.  Not too much can go close to house without causing problems.  Composted manure is ok.  Cottonseed burr is probably ok.  All other organics - potential catastrophe.

No, they don't check for bugs.  Or spray the stuff.  Would you really want all those toxics where your friends, family, kids are gonna be??

Point taken. Always wondered what happened to hay after Halloween!

[heironymouspasparagus]

rdj,

Pine anything is likely to be contaminated with the pine nematode that is killing all the pine trees locally.  Bad stuff.

Gently treat with powdered sulfur for acid loving plants.  Get a soil test first to make sure you need it.
OSU extension on 15th and the OSU web site have more info than you can ever digest.


Honey,
Use that hay!

[rdj]

Thanks for the heads up.  I built raised garden beds for the wife this spring.  She has wanted to use hay from day one for mulch.  However, she hasn't located any.  Good tip on securing a bale at this point in the season?

[Conan71]

Thanks for the heads up.  I built raised garden beds for the wife this spring.  She has wanted to use hay from day one for mulch.  However, she hasn't located any.  Good tip on securing a bale at this point in the season?

As I recall, you live up on Reservoir Hill or nearby.  Atwoods in Sand Springs might be worth a shot.  Otherwise, I'd guess there's got to be some sort of farm and ranch store around Bixby.  Inola is known as the hay capital of the world, but not sure who you would buy from out there.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Lee's Feed out on east 11th always has hay in square bales.  If only need a couple or a few, that will likely be the most cost effective - put a tarp in your trunk and load it up.  They don't have the 'big' selection of the big box stores, but for seed and fertilizer and "Co-op store" related stuff, they are pretty good.  Knowledgeable too.

Do you have a pickup to haul it in?  If so, then you can usually find the big round bales (between 1,500 and 2,000 lbs each).  Will look up some numbers for you if you have a truck and want bigger quantities.  Flatbed trailer and you can haul more than one.  (Mine holds 3 at a time. Put 6 rounds on the garden last fall.)

Take a Saturday or Sunday afternoon ride in the country to look around for sources - plus get an enjoyable afternoon ride in the country.

Hay is good!  Wood is evil!

Unless the wood is in ash form - if you have a backyard campfire fixture, and don't burn any Kingsford, you could put some wood ash on the garden, too.  (Again, have a soil test.)  Ash is good 'sweetener' for the soil (less acid).  Kingsford is bad ash for garden because it is about half anthracite coal.  One reason I don't use it for cooking out - I only use the hardwood charcoal.

[rdj]

Thanks for the tips.  I may have to investigate more this weekend.  At a depth of two inches I'd only need about 2.5-3 cubic feet of hay.  You wouldn't happen to know how many cubic feet are in a bale of hay would you?

Conan, I do live at Reservoir Hill, not on, at, as in at the base.  We are on the wrong side of the street for the neighborhood association to consider us "Reservoir Hill".  From a plat standpoint we are in the same 'hood.  I'm not bitter or anything.  LOL.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Square bales are roughly 18 x 18 x 36.  Starts at about 6 to 7 cubic feet and rots/collapses down to probably 1 or 2.

Spreading it out evenly will probably give you a much thicker layer, but it will 'collapse' over time.  It will NOT be a smooth, even, 3" layer.  It will be rough and ripply for a while.  (Best case is to start in late summer/fall, let it rot over winter, then spread it out.)

Repeat every year.

But fresh is still an excellent mulch to hold in moisture and keep down weeds.  Good stuff.  Adds organic matter to the soil over time.

[HoneySuckle]

Someone recommeded Cedar mulch to me and said to get it from Attwoods in BA. 

Are you against Cedar as well?  They said there shouldn't be problems with termites.  We have brick the first half up on our house.  Not sure if that helps!

[heironymouspasparagus]

If you absolutely can not live without a wood mulch, cedar is the one to use.  ALL cedar - not the "blend".  Cedar is also the most attractive, I think.

And the aromatic red cedar (really - juniperous virginiana) chips like they put in hamster cages is a great bedding for outside dogs AND I also spread it through the yard as a mild repellent for fleas and ticks.  Works well unless there is just a huge infestation.  Looks a little wonky for a while - all those chips laying down in the grass - but they disappear after a couple mowings.  If you want a putting green yard, this isn't for you.  Plus I don't use a whole lot - a 3 cubic foot bale would do my entire yard (65 x 125 minus 1,000 sq ft for house), spread thinly.  (I still don't like wood mulches - no added value there.)

[HoneySuckle]

I don't care for mulch, but started using it so I wouldn't have as many weeds cropping up in my flower or herb beds.  Otherwise I'd really skip that altogether. 

I do have some ground cover growing in other areas and boy they tend to really strangle everything in sight, not just weeds!  I've lost a number of better plants that way.

Not sure if the cedar mulch I got at Attwoods was ALL cedar.  It didn't mention a blend.  Hoping it's the real thing.  They tried to get me to buy the Cyprus mulch though

[heironymouspasparagus]

Cypress is kind of similar, but not quite as good as cedar for bug resistance stuff.

Ground covers pretty much by definition mean "extremely intrusive".

Gets tricky, don't it?  No free lunch for shade!