Hi Ken- Welcome to the Forum.... I'm in St Pete and love roses as well... I have lots of roses grafted on Fortuniana, it is recommended for Fla. because of the nematodes, I get mine mail-order from K & M Roses in Miss. I also have some own-root OGRs also Austins... I try and grow organic, I use all kinds of stuff, Milorganite, Black Cow, Black Hen, Alfalfa pellets, Cottonseed meal, Fish emulsion... and use leaves and grass clippings and compost, thick mulch, the thicker the mulch the better.... the Tampa Rose Society is prob. near you and can help, I belong to the Heritage Rose Society in Lakeland at Fla. Southern, Dr. Manners is there and is a wonderful fountain of information, it's a great group of folks from all over Fla. .... I plant lots of my roses close together and use rebar as plant-stakes, and tie wayward canes to the rebar, to keep a pathway thru' the beds....and I plant companion flowers in front, Victoria Blue perennial Salvia and Pentas , Caladiums, Purslane, Tampa Verbaine - all make good border-plants and are low-growing.... so much fun and so little time !.........sally

Ezzirah, Straw is sprayed with herbicides too. All it takes is a very minute amount of herbicide residue (perhaps as small as one part per billion) on hay, straw, in animal manure from animals that ate the contaminated hay, or compost made from contaminated ingredients to contaminate your soil. Contaminated soil will vary in how long it remains barren and for most gardeners it seems like it takes at least 3 or 4 years before they can grow anything in the garden again other than grasses or grains. The 3 to 4 years of "down time" that most people see is a much longer period than the manufacturer says their research indicates. I've linked a permaculture website that addresses herbicide contamination and the writer shows some of their own plants in soil he or she was testing for contamination, and further down the page describes how the contamination issue affected their plants. The only way to know for sure you have non-contaminated hay or straw is to get it directly from the person who grew it and make sure that it was not sprayed with any of the herbicides known to persist for long periods of time. I only get hay from people I know do not ever, ever, ever spray their fields and even then you run the risk that their next-door neighbor could have sprayed this herbicide and it could have drifted into non-sprayed area. When I buy hay from a feed store, I only buy alfalfa hay and I don't buy straw because the local suppliers cannot tell me if it was sprayed or not. Your local feed store or hay broker may or may not know if their hay or straw was sprayed. Our local feed store sometimes knows and sometimes has no idea. All the herbicides that persist in hay, straw, manure, compost and soil are sprayed to kill broad-leaved weeds in grass and grain crops, along road, railroad and utility line right-of-ways, and even on golf courses. Since alfalfa is not a grass or grain (it is a legume), it cannot be sprayed with those herbicides, so there is not a deadly herbicide residue issue with it. I used to bring in lots of mulch and soil amendments from outside our property, whether they were locally-grown hay or bagged products from a store, but almost everything I use now come from our own property because that's the only way I have of knowing I'm not contaminating my soil with herbicide residue. It takes me so much more time to mow and collect grass clippings to use as mulch than it takes to go to the feed store and buy bales of hay, but at least this way I know I'm not bringing contaminated materials onto our property. Just one bale of contaminated straw or hay or one bag of contaminated manure or compost could destroy your ability to raise non-grass, non-grain crops for years. Everyone who has this happen to them always is shocked and has that "I didn't think this ever would happen to me" attitude, and I understand that, but sadly it has happened to them and it continues to happen. In a very odd and ironic twist, the contaminated compost, manure and mulch issue has hit organic gardeners especially hard despite their efforts to avoid chemicals in the garden. That's because it tends to be organic gardeners who are adding compost and manure to their garden beds, and using hay or straw for mulch. For organic growers who are "certified organic", their certification can be yanked after they've gone to great effort and expense to get it in the first place. The herbicide contamination issue is largely ignored by the media and mostly only discussed after many gardens in one area are wiped out by herbicide contamination. I think that's because it first showed up in the beds of organic gardeners back in the early 2000s when organic gardening was not as popular or as widespread as it is now and organic gardeners still were thought of as a fringe element. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Herbicide Contamination

The fungus is there because organic things rot and fungi are part of the rotting process. Though it looks unappetizing, it's actually quite a good thing. It could just as easily happen on bagged mulch. It will not hurt plants. The landscape fabric may, as barngod says, have helped encourage it by holding moisture, but it probably would have happened anyway. You can turn the mulch or not - the fungus will probably come back. You can spray something on the fungus, but there's no reason to do that. What you have is normal, harmless to plants and, ultimately, good for the soil. Consider stripping out that landscape fabric, though. It's not doing anybody much good. If you tilled in wiregrass without picking out the pieces of the roots, it may well be back and the fabric won't stop it.

My first choice is , followed by costal bermuda hay then straw. There are no seeds in leaves, usually none in the costal bermuda but can be in straw. Normally, if you have a good three inch layer that is thick enough to block out the day light, little if any seed will sprout and come up thru the mulch. If a few do, they are easy to pull up. I do not know how much you have to mulch, or what the price of hay run at a local feed store, but one bale of coastal bermuda would probably run around 10 bucks and cover a pretty good sized area. It is fine and covers well. I got for asking at our local feed store. Good luck with your mulching, I hope that this helps some. Just my .02 Bill P.