Using wood chips-good, bad, or ugly?
bill_59texas
11 years ago
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Lloyd
11 years agoKimmsr
11 years agoRelated Discussions
The good, the bad, and the ugly at CRSC...
Comments (38)Several of you sweet people have asked how the foot is...bless your hearts! The Bad: Briefly, Murphy's law rules....Surgery Friday 4/20, went great, home that night. 2 days of pain and drugs, then not so bad. Check up Monday, all is well. Wednesday my left leg swelled up, achy calf, back in to dr...blood clots in my calf - boom, into the hospital. Out Saturday on Coumadin blah, blah, blah. Back into the ER at 1am Monday with several pulmonary emboli. Ambulance ride to St Cloud hospital 90 miles away for an IVC filter (Inferior Vena Cava filter) to prevent more clots to the lungs. Sprung from there Wednesday. Feel like a pin cushion from having my blood drawn so often. Helped cheer on the tree planters Saturday, couldn't help much :(. My pond is still dormant :( but I'm thinking a pond party (ha) is in order. I'm still having a hard time asking for help, and sometimes get pretty down being so helpless. The good: No pain. My achille's tendon is doing great, no more pain in my heel, calf, chest, or neck (where they put the filter in thru my jugular). Back to work today FINALLY! I have WONDERFUL parents and friends helping me with everything including sheep chores! Still planning on getting to my conference in Orlando 5/22. So I'm good to go and in another 10 days and 3 hours I hope to be weight bearing and able to walk! Thank you all for keeping me in your thoughts, I KNOW they help!!! Sarah...See MoreChanges we have made...the good, the bad and the ugly
Comments (22)This thread has been interesting! One change we're currently working on, is putting cedar raised beds around the perimeter of our patio. [Two sides, actually; the other two sides are the outside walls of our house and entryway.] My DH and boys have been working on them this week, and I can hardly wait to start planting veggies, flowers, and herbs in them! I'm a newbie to potager gardening, [2 experimental yrs.!] so I must admit, I'm not sure my hodge podge of plants will look very "coordinated"! I guess I'll just dive in and start planting, and see what works! One challenge I have: Because of a gigantic oak, the area is shaded until 2 or 3, then gets blasted with afternoon sun. I have some sweet peas that I'd love to incorporate, but I'm not sure they'll appreciate that! Any ideas? I wanted some fragrant plants out there as well, since we often use the space in the evening, with candlelight, music, ect.... So far, my "hodge podge" consists of Jasmine in windowboxes, a few White Ginger Lilies, a trellis of Confederate Jasmine [against the house], [wonderful vine, BTW!] a climbing Don Juan rose [also against the house], cherry tomato plants, basil, lemon verbena, a few peppers, lettuce and mixed greens......and of course, the sweet peas, which are already flowering in their overgrown pot....See MoreTell me the good, bad and ugly about cats!
Comments (78)Thanks to you all for posting the pic for me! natal, Thanks! I had to postpone the vet appt to Tuesday. My dryer quit working and had to get it fixed that day. sable, I will definately ask the vet if it could possibly be asthma. She still does it a lot! Funny thing about her, I was ready for her to be a "talker" since she is a siamese mix, and she hardly talks! Maybe she will as she gets older? bestyears, she is doing great with my son! She still loves my DH the best though. My son wants to carry her around, when she would rather be sleeping, I think. He sometimes picks her up when she's in her little post (in the pic), asleep. tjerrilynn, that is the CUTEST thing I have ever seen! I love his (or her) haircut! marlene, thank you and I am glad to hear about the male and female cats together. I am going to seriously start looking for another one. betsyhac, your cats are so pretty and full-figured-LOL! June is on the skinny side now, and I'm guessing she will be until she gets out of the kitten stage. I wonder what she will look like when she's all mature! She plays with us a lot now, and is very curious. She loves to lay on her back and let us rub her belly until she falls asleep, so cute! I got a hooded kitty litter box and she likes it, thank goodness! It has been much easier to keep clean around the box now. I put one of those rubber (I think) kind of pads down in front of her box as she walks out and it has made such a difference, plus the hood on the box. She has Softpaws on her nails right now, baby blue to match her eyes! We just love her!...See MoreWood chips as mulch for fruit trees...good or bad?
Comments (3)I'm no expert, but I did come across this, which sounds promising: "Soil Carbon Pools, Nitrogen Supply, and Tree Performance under Several Groundcovers and Compost Rates in a Newly Planted Apple Orchard. Source: HortScience . Dec2011, Vol. 46 Issue 12, p1687-1694. 8p. Abstract: This study evaluated the effects of in-row groundcovers (bare ground, brassica seed meal, cultivation, wood chip mulch , legume cover crop, and non-legume cover crop) and three compost rates (48, 101, and 152 kg available nitrogen(N)/ha/year) on soil carbon (C) pools, biological activity, N supply, fruit yield, and tree growth in a newly planted apple (Malus domestica Borkh.) orchard. We used nonlinear regression analysis of C mineralization curves to differentiate C into active and slow soil C pools. Bare ground and cultivation had large active soil C pools, 1.07 and 0.89 g C/kg soil, respectively, but showed little stabilization of C into the slow soil C pool. The use of brassica seed meal resulted in increased soil N supply, the slow soil C pool, and earthworm activity but not total soil C and N, fruit yield, or tree growth. Legume and non-legume cover crops had increased microbial biomass and the slow soil C pool but had lower fruit yield and tree growth than all other groundcovers regardless of compost rate. Soils under wood chip mulch had elevated earthworm activity, total soil C and N, and the slow soil C pool. Wood chip mulch also had the greatest cumulative C mineralization and a high C:N ratio, which resulted in slight N immobilization. Nevertheless, trees in the two wood chip treatments ranked in the top four of the 13 treatments in both fruit yield and tree growth. Wood chip mulch offered the best balance of tree performance and soil quality of all treatments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]" I've also read some studies which say the opposite, for example, https://books.google.ca/books?id=uMIXAAAAYAAJ&ots=627Q7jWJwL&dq=wood%20mulch%20nitrogen&lr&pg=PA17#v=onepage&q=wood%20mulch%20nitrogen&f=false, which says the decomposition of the mulch and tie up the mobility of nitrogen. On YouTube there are many gardeners supporting the benefits of wood chip mulch. I use cedar mulch myself around perennials and they seem fine. I do pull the cedar mulch slightly away from the base of plants to as not directly touch them as I've heard cedar can burn plants.......See Moreannpat
11 years agoemgardener
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