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Looks like your lists of pros and cons is unbiased :)
There is a place for both. A small herbacous border mulched could look very silly. Kept bare you can easily blow off leaves and debris and the dark soil gives a perfect background to the delicate and varying plants in there.
Shrub beds I would almost always mulch given the choice.
Veg beds - hard to think of a varied veg bed with mulch.
Paul i have a client with extensive garden lighting, she has cables just lying on the soil, not even buried. I have personally cut through these at least 2 or 3 times, either from digging up plants or trimming her box hedging.
Paul @ PPCH Services said:
Big fan of rotted horse manure for shrub beds. Excellent stuff for top dressing, and when applyed thickly 4 to 5 inches, it can last at least two years before requiring topping up. Granted, the shrub beds will still need weeded, however, weeding becomes quicker as the mulch is loose and weeds are pulled without much effort. In addition to horse manure, I favour very fine chipped bark.
Key for any organic type mulch is to apply it in sufficient thickness.
Agree with both the above totally agree with dan I would mulch shrub beds if i had the choice. mulching with gravel has its place but I dont like to see gardens mith nothing but gravel and a couple of shrubs or bamboo it looks awful.
A border IMO should be full of varied perenials and shrubs that provide ground cover and height minimising the amount of soil where weeds will grow thus meaning only small areas of hoeing needed
Maybe you should suggest they need digging in then and protecting
Chris Auld said:
Keep the hoe well-sharpened and use it on a dry day, it's very quick and effective.
Most mulches don't keep weeds out, in fact they often provide a perfect seedbed!
Mulches improve the soil well and encourage worm action to improve the soil. Often although compost, farm yard manure, horse manure are well rotten and in the rotting process they reach high temperatures to destroy seeds making them non viable they still are viable seeds present and if not birds will bring them in so weeds will grow but they can be easily pulled out either by hand or hoe. I find wood chip the worst for seed growth.
hi chris we used to do sixty cubic mts in the private gardens each winter and is very good but it can be expensive last year we done about five mts i think due to the economic climate. if the soil is poor it becomes quite hard to hoe.
Hi Drew, saw you down in harmony hill today, thats my territory ;)
andrew magill said:
we grass cutting job in a rental house for a lady from richmond lodge chris .Have you tried campbells mulch we call it arthurs bowers special
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