If you are a homeowner or a garden enthusiast, garden mulch is essential to keep your garden healthy. Spring and summer are the perfect time to add or replace garden mulch as the warmer temperature influences the condition of the soil.
And when you have a busy schedule and want a low maintenance green space, garden mulch becomes your best friend.
What Is Mulch?
Mulch is a protective layer of organic material applied to the soil's surface.
The word mulch is derived from the German word “molsh”, meaning soft or decaying.
Modern mulching practices started to emerge between the 17th and 18th centuries. Over time, people noticed how natural materials were beneficial to the soil and kept the weeds out. In the 1900s, property owners started using this method more and more on their property.
Today, we have an abundance of garden mulch available for commercial and residential purposes, from natural to synthetic. Although, woodchip is the most common method.
What Are The Benefits Of Mulching?
Mulch has many advantages. In nature, the soil is naturally covered by a layer of decaying matter like leaves. When soil is exposed to the sun and wind, protecting your garden beds and adding garden mulch around your trees is crucial. If uncovered, the ground will suffer in summer and dry out.
Mulch holds and maintains moisture, which means you don’t need to water your trees and plants all the time. It will also slowly release nutrients down to the roots when it rains. In addition, applying water to the soil will regulate its temperature, keeping it cool during the summer and warm during the winter. Garden mulch also helps control weeds and improves aeration and soil drainage over time.
Tips When Mulching
Mulch has to be appropriately applied. If there’s too much of it and it is the wrong material, it may cause significant damage to your trees. Around trees, we suggest adding about 100mm thick woodchips.
Water by hand early in the morning or late in the evening, so water doesn’t evaporate. In addition, we recommend using proper woodchips from a mulched tree. Don’t purchase bags of decorative mulch from your local retailers and use tree mulch, not bark mulch, because it has little nutritional value. Furthermore, organic garden mulch will ensure that the soil doesn’t dry out.
When applying it to the ground, garden mulch needs to be at least six months old. When adding it to your garden, you need consistency in the mix to break down in the soil properly. Green fresh mulch creates an unnatural nitrogen imbalance in the ground. Brown rotten mulch slowly releases nitrogen back into the soil.
It is also better to leave old leaves on the ground to rot and break down as they will get absorbed by the soil as a natural process and act as garden mulch.
Remember, garden mulch is critical because it keeps the soil temperature consistent, holds the moisture in the soil and is a biodegradable matter.
Feel free to contact our team. We are happy to deliver and spread mulch for you!
