Yes to logic but what really happens is cardboard decomposes and staples become loose. Often when weeding I will find a staple from a couple of years ago when that particular bed was created with cardboard, etc. Doubt it is dangerous to kids of pets. I very enthusiastically recommend paper or cardboard for weed supression

Thanks for that. If my design plan works out, it shouldn't be a heavily travelled area - maybe just for an occasional harvesting of veggies or fruits, and I'd like to keep the mulch level at 3-4". So I'll just wear shoes when harvesting for 5 years :-)

This is the pic - attachment doesn't seem to be working for me right now, so here's the link instead - www.gthomson.us/projects/landscaping/cardboardquestion.jpg

This solved two problems for me - also cleared up garage space where I was keeping the boxes for some future unknown purpose.

A win-win-win, I like that...

Even if the staples were made of an iron component they would not provide the Ferric Oxide (iron) plants need and most of the staples I have seen used for cardboard boxes have been copper or aluminum and not iron or steel.

What those staples will do is present an injury hazard to you, or anyone else that digs in your garden. I would not put them in my garden for any reason.

kimmq is kimmsr

My question... the boxes sometimes have big staples.

I remove them because scratching myself on a staple later, after the cardboard has decomposed is painful and dangerous.

The staples in the boxes j use are large, not like office staples. I don't go fishing for them, just remove when I see them, which is very rare as they are usually underneath 3-4" of mulch, which gets reapplied annually, so most get deeper and deeper. Not a danger in my world plus I wear gloves relugiously

Thanks all, I thought if they provided something useful to the soil/plants, like iron, after broken down, it might make sense to leave them. But as kimmq mentioned, they wouldn't provide the right kind of stuff anyway. I think they were steel, about 2", but not sure. And now that I think about iron too, cast iron type tub comes to mind... I guess I need to refresh my memory on chemistry a bit - probably no iron in those staples, but that's just an un-educated guess.

So I had only put the piles of compost in the center, and was able to go around and easily pull out the staples. Covered in compost and mulch now, so it's all good, and I have a clearer mind that there won't be rusty staples out there for me, my pooch, or others to step on in the future because of me.

But I do feel like a dufus...
I had this big accumulation of cardboard boxes in my garage that just kept growing larger. Hated to put them in the recycling bin because I might need them to ship something in sometime. And I was initially buying newspaper, then postal shipping paper, then Home Depot rolls of construction paper(?) to put down before the compost and mulch. Then the light bulb went on, and it must be one of those low level solar lights in the yard that are too dim, and last too short a time :-)... Hmmm, why don't I use those boxes instead? For what I was spending on newspaper and construction paper and shipping paper, I can use the boxes instead, and if I need a box sometime, I've saved enough to splurge and buy one :-)