Who said removing mulch would warm the soil? And why do you want to warm the soil?

It is not necessary to remove mulches to "warm" soil. Plants in my garden grow just fine through the mulches which remain in place year around, except that the soil bacteria tend to digest them too quickly. Plants that self seed grow just as well as the others through the mulch, sometihng those self seeding plants have done for eons out in the wild.
There is simply no good reason to remove mulches.

I have "heard" about this several times maybe through reading or on garden shows. The idea is that since mulches are insulating the soil stays colder longer with mulch on it. And maybe the reason is removing it gets spring going faster and plants won't rot under the mulch? I poke around and gently uncover emerging plants (big thrill!) but leave most mulch in place. Thanks for your comments, guys! Anyone out there have a reason for removing mulch? I'd like to hear it even though I would like to remain lazy!

You're right, Kim. I'm still pulling mulch back because a bizarre spring brought us more snow in April than we had in January through March combined. It's gone in open areas but the woods still have several inches of snow. If I don't pull it back and let the sun warm the soil I'll have spring bulbs blooming in June and the soil will take too long to warm enough for the annuals.

Slightly along this same line, if you leave mulch on the beds, how do you add organic matter to the soil?

"There is simply no good reason to remove mulches."

Umm- well, if you have 6-10" of leaves on a bed... then it's a very good idea.

I take off mulch to let soil warm up a bit faster. Solar gain, and just removal of insulation- it's a basic fact that insulation reduces soil temp changes. Go figure.

It's not as big a deal for perrenials, but bulbs, garlic, and my veggie garden- I take it off and leave maybe an inch or 2 until it warms back up.

Kimmsr got called out on this one. I agree the soil needs to be warmed during this time and with mulch it just takes that much longer for it to occur.

In the fall I put down 6 to 8 inches of shredded leaves as a mulch on as many beds as I can and in some 50 years of gardening in various places around the states have never found a good reason to remove any mulch material so the soil will "warm up". If someone were to wait until after the soil freezes, maybe, possibly they would need to but that is the wrong time to mulch too. But soil will warm up whether mulch is present or not. Look in the forest and tell me who goes out there and removes the mulch from that forest. The soil in the forest warms up and plants grow, all with no intervention for us and they have been doing so for many more years than people have been growing plants.
People that think mulches need to be removed from a garden have lost a connection to nature.

I am starting my first garden where there had once been some kind of herb garden; it was tilled a year ago and I put in some tomatoes that did okay. Last fall I threw the leaves on that entire area; the wind blew many away thru the winter, I raked the rest away last week! Then I read a book about Ruth Stout and mulching. yesterday I acquired two large boxes of hay/straw from my cousin.

So..anyone ever use the Stout method? I was excited to start this but a local nursery person informed me it won't work; she also said I should stop using mulch on my perennials as they need 'space' to breathe. But I've been dumping that lovely 'red' mulch all over the hostas, 'susans', peonies, day lilies, etc.'..for two years now and they seem to be doing fine.

so..two questions..
anyone using the Ruth Stout method of mulching in vegetable gardens?
is is okay to use that red mulch on perennials?

And one more question...my aunts told me I should NOT plant anything until the 'lead' days of May are over..that's May 12th -15th..anyone ever hear of the lead days?

thank you..

I use it. Seems like as many as half or more of the folks here use some variation now- sheet mulching, permanent mulching, lasagna gardening- it actually works incredibly well.

That garden center person has some preconceived notions, but apparently little direct experience.

I did like kimmsr and put lots of ground up leaves (6 inches on average) on my beds last Fall. I'm planniung to rake it up for browns to compost with the bags of grass clippings which should begin showing up in front of my neighbors' houses any day now. I can reapply grass clippings this summer as needed.

I use the Ruth Stout method with some variation. It does work. It just made sense to me to do what mother nature does. The soil in the woods seems to be doing just fine. The garden store person simply has no experience with this method and is just going by what he knows. (not much) I do turn my soil and add layers of material as I see fit but I always add a permanent mulch as a last layer.
As to pulling back the mulch sometimes I have to do so to find some dirt to plant in. My mulch is pretty deep in places, maybe 15-20 inches. I almost always make a hole in the mulch at least enough to get to dirt. I may go to the trouble of turning the dirt in the spring but often not. As to warming the soil, I think you could just cover the bed with a sheet of clear plastic and after a few sunny days you would have soil as warm as you want. If you live in the north where your season is short and you are anxious to get to stirring in the dirt a raised bed will give you the drainage that you need to have workable soil in the early part of the season. Often it is not so much the warmth of the soil but the water issue especially if you have heavy clay soil. Hope your season goes well.

Simply amazing. People "use the Ruth Stout" method of mulching and then do what she never did, remove the mulch in the spring. All the Ruth Stout ever did in the spring is pull some of the mulch back enough so the seedling she planted was not well hidden from sunlight. Ruth Stout never found a good reason to remove any of the thick mulch on her garden in the spring.
Once again, there is simply no good reason to remove mulch in the spring, or any other time.

Well kimmsr...

"For instance, she acknowledged that in the spring after a hard winter, the mulch piles need to be opened up slightly to let in the warmth of sunlight to create greater heat for decomposition."

Maybe she did something between what you say, and what I do. Nobody here claimed to be a disciple, or strict adherent to any one method.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ruth Stout article

There are other factors involved besides the insulation qualities of mulch. Solar gain, daytime and night time temperatures, wind, humidity, and even the microbial activity contributes to soil temp.

You can't have solar gain on the soil in the shade. I don't know the shade situation, but if there are trees or buildings nearby, even a bright day's solar gain will be lessened. That's why you'll see snow on the north side of a tree or a slope for weeks or even months after the sun has melted south-facing snow.

What every insulation does is to "damp" the temperature fluctuation from one side of the insulation to the other. Without outside help, eventually the temperatures on both sides of the insulation will become the same. The mulch applied in the fall will slow the cooling while the same mulch will also slow the warming as winter ends. One thing that can be done to make the mulch nearly completely worthless in the heat transfer regard is to wet it down. Wet mulch has almost no insulation capability. But there again, there are other factors involved. On low humidity days and nights, the moisture in wet mulch will evaporate thereby cooling the mulch and the soil/air touching it.

I think this mulch removal issue goes to historical precedent. If your daddy did it, then you should do it. I don't see a need to do it. As kimmsr said, Mother Nature has no process equivalent to mulch removal. In speaking against the concept, it exposes the soil and any weed seeds to the sunlight necessary for the seedling to photosynthesize and take root.

margiemeg: I see you're new here, and welcome. The way this works is...if you want to ask a question that isn't nearly identical to the one we're talking about, then you need to start a new message. Otherwise, nobody knows to come to this thread to help you with your issue. You could start a new 'thread' with the subject, "Stout method of mulching," and paste in your question above.

dchall- I still had snow in my front yard yesterday, though it was in the mid 70's (aluminum roof- it slides into a pile, and that side of the house is shaded). Today it will be 88F, then back to the 50's with nightime temps in the high 30's.

You are right- it's probably as much habit and cultural practice as anything. I have more mulch than I need- I'd like it as a compost pile because my lawn needs far more OM than my garden, leaving a couple/few inches as protection.

Looking through more material on Ruth Stout- she mentions 8" fluffy hay, which may compact to 2" as it settles and is walked on. Well, I don't walk on mine, and I leave that much anyway. She didn't plant IN mulch (lasagna etc), but mulched between plants- planting in the soil.

Another point made was that most will find that the method works because they will do what it takes to make it work. Interesting comment on bias, but it also speaks to variations in climate/shade/etc.

I will throw in my $.02; mulch most certainly will slow soil warming in the spring, particularly light colored mulch which reflect light. That is why I mulch my lupines with straw in the early spring, to keep things cool as long as possible. If one wanted to warm the soil quickly they would farm it into tall ridges. This helps the soil drain which greatly aids warming and puts the surface at a steeper angle which intercepts more solar radiation. In general the function of mulch (in regard to temperature) is to maintain a steady soil temperature, not keep it warm or cool it down.

"Slightly along this same line, if you leave mulch on the beds, how do you add organic matter to the soil?"

You can't add organic matter to the soil; only soil organisms can do that. As simple and declarative as this statement is that is exactly what I've found in all the research I've done and reviewed.

The question about when or why to remove mulch, if you know exactly when the last hard frost will happen then do it the next day, if you know for sure of course? Of course I wouldn't do it period. The soil knows how to deal with mulch (organic matter).

"I was excited to start this but a local nursery person informed me it won't work; she also said I should stop using mulch on my perennials as they need 'space' to breathe."

I called on the nursery trade for about 30 years and they give out more bad information than you can keep track of! It is a seasonal business so many employees are working their first year and the owners are dealing with so many plant types that they are often short on specific information. I would do my research outside of nurseries.

In this particular case I think it was simple BS and the guy had no idea what he was talking about!

Always take the advice of nursery employees with a large grain of salt. A short time ago I had to shop for a tree and stopped at one nursery and inquired about a "Cersis" and an "Amelanchier" and the horticulturist kept talking about a redbud and a hemlock. Wife called the same place to inquire about planting trees, she does not always listen to me, and was told that this is the wrong time of year to plant trees. This nursery does not get my business, unless they have really good sales.
We did get a tree and it was planted for Earth Day.

We have a nursery pretty close to me that stocks plants that cost so much more than HD, Lowe's, or the local Texas chain of garden stores. When you ask them why their plants are so much more expensive, they tell you it's because they only sell the plants that do well in our soil (alkaline), climate (ranging from 25 to 100 degrees F), and water conditions (also alkaline). Apparently the other places sell plants trucked in from all over that don't do well. This nursery has had the same employees for 10 years, so I'm comfortable with them.