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Soil, Compost & Mulch

Help! How can I use fresh cut grass without composting?

16 years ago

I have access to lots of fresh cut grass every monday when the mowers come through and mow the complexes park lawns.

I DONT have a way to compost the stuff the traditional way because I don't have room for one and I have no permission to make one.

The grass, however, is free, is accessible, and is nitrogen rich. I tried spreading it on as a layer on top of the soil but it soon dried into a crusty plate with a slimy soggy bottom.

PLEASE - How can I incorporate this stuff into my garden and flower bed soil without having to 'COMPOST' it first? And I know, I know - the grass is hot and will burn the plants very easily. I plan on adding the grass SLOOOWLY, a little bit each week so it doesnt. Been there, learned that. :)

ANY IDEAS would be appreciated!

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Comments (5)

david52 Zone 6
16 years ago
First, I'd look and see if the lawn in the parks is suspiciously weed free - look for clover and dandylion. If you don't see any, then it is likely that they spray herbicide, most parks do. You might want to go a bit easy if they do spray.

I have a large lawn that isn't sprayed, and I collect the clippings and just dump them in all the beds, spread them around as mulch, just let them do what they do. The slimy bottom layer breaks down - no problem.
tweedbunny
Original Author
16 years ago
Don't mind clover and dandylion at all. My bunnies love both and if TOO many dandylion are coming up, I just pry them out with my handy-dandylion tool. :)

Its my subdivisions lawn clippings so I know they don't have pesticides but do have fertilizer on them.
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tclynx
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Bagged grass does have a tendency to mat together so you may simply want to try to spread it in as thin a layer as possible. I've mixed grass clippings into dirt and other ingredients and dumped it into containers, it will become a bit of a slimey smelly mess that way too. It is part of the decomposition process. If you can get shredded up carbon material (like leaves) to layer over the grass clippings in the garden it may help things look/smell nicer.
bob64
16 years ago
Spread thinly it has not been a problem for me in flower beds and under shrubs and trees. The clippings I used in thin layers tended to dissappear within a few weeks or less. If you get the slimy mats of grass clippings, you could break them up on occassion. If there is a part of your garden bed that nothing is growing in, you can pile up any excess clippings there, worms and bacteria might help reduce the pile of excess clippings for you and that spot will be nice and rich later on.
Kimmsr
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A layer of grass clippings over 3 inches thick will heat up and generate an unpleasant odor as well as harm any plants that touches, but less than that usually does not get that hot, so if the grass clipping mulch is kept to a layer of less than 2 inches, and kept a couple of inches away from plant stems, there should not be a problem. In a good, healthy soil those clippings should be fairly quickly digested, and incorporated into the soil, by your soil bacteria, much better than you could ever do that.

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