I needed mulch to keep the weeds down between the shrubs in my yard. A visit to the local poleyard was in order.
The mulch is the chipped up bark of the mostly firs that are peeled to make nice smooth telephone poles.
All the peelings are sorted into mountains. Some are long strands of bark mulch, some are smaller chips of bark, and some are just ratty, junky pieces that aren’t good for much.
My garden needed the smaller chips so we parked the truck and utility trailer at the side of the road between the mulch mountains and waited for the loader to come and help us out.
Here he comes with his scoop in front.
One of those big scoops holds what they call a yard of mulch (we pay by the yard).
I’m always amazed at how little they drop on the way to the trailer.
Here comes our one yard of bark mulch.
When he drops it into the trailer and pats it down with the scoop, the truck shakes like in an earthquake.
It doesn’t seem like a lot until you start unloading it.
While I was waiting for the loader to come, I took a couple of short video clips to show how they take the raw logs and put them into the machine that scores the bark and flips the logs around and around. The power is awe-inspiring. Have you ever tried to juggle a log that size? Look at how the blades cut into the bark without cutting up the wood.
In the second video, you can see the bark mulch shooting out the long pipe to be piled up into those bark mulch mountains. Not much is wasted.
Next time you see bark mulch around a pretty shrub, think about how that log bounced around as it was stripped of its coat. It’s a good thing I can’t talk to the trees or hear what they’re saying, but if I had to guess, I’d bet they’re calling to each other, “Anybody got a coat they can lend me?”
“Naw, they took mine too!”
.
.
June 6, 2020 at 10:13 pm
Hahaha. π
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June 6, 2020 at 10:18 pm
Poor little bare naked trees.
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June 6, 2020 at 11:39 pm
Interesting video. I tried mulching as well but the weeds are coming up anyway.
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June 7, 2020 at 8:47 am
It’s like what Sonja said, about having to put it down 3 or 4 inches thick and even then it has to be repeated each year. It doesn’t kill the weeds, but it does weaken them.
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June 7, 2020 at 5:27 am
This is an amazing post, Anneli. Thanks for the mulching lesson. π
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June 7, 2020 at 8:44 am
I took the camera along for the ride but really hadn’t expected to find anything interesting. Then I realized that the poles and the mulch were all connected, so I got busy clicking pics.
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June 7, 2020 at 6:45 am
Interesting that your mulch comes from a forestry product And telephone pole production! Our bulk mulch down here is a waste stream from the county so is a hodgepodge of tree types. Itβs quite a large chunk on ours, so we usually buy cedar mulch by the bag.
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June 7, 2020 at 8:40 am
Ooh! Buying it by the bag is very expensive around here. Much cheaper to buy it by the yard. Interesting that your mulch source is so different from ours.
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June 7, 2020 at 7:33 am
That is amazing. I had no idea. My sister (who lives in a similar rural area) would like you.
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June 7, 2020 at 8:37 am
Would she be into coming over to help me unload and spread it around?
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June 7, 2020 at 7:58 am
I could use a lot of that mulch in my garden! Well, you know what they say “Weeds are just flowers growing in the wrong place.” The trick with mulch is, it has to be quite thick to keep the weeds down. I’ve heard most people say they use 3 to 4 inches of mulch if they are not putting a landscape cloth down first. May have to give that a try for our front borders. Great video clips!
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June 7, 2020 at 8:36 am
That’s right, Sonja. We just keep adding layers every year or so. It’s an ongoing job. Looks nice for a while after it’s just done.
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June 7, 2020 at 8:59 am
Wow, that’s a mean machine! And a whole lot of mulch, Anneli!!
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June 7, 2020 at 10:22 am
Yeah, it’s way more than it looks once you start moving it with the wheelbarrow.
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June 7, 2020 at 12:05 pm
That mulch looks good. We got ours -plus some compost – from our local landfill place, and we seem to have gotten a fungus with it:
https://wp.me/p4uPk8-2dw
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June 7, 2020 at 9:03 pm
That stuff looks disgusting. So glad we haven’t got it in our mulch. Does that fungus spread much?
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June 8, 2020 at 7:54 am
It doesn’t look like it spreads too much. It just depends where the spores are, and what the conditions [it needs warmth and moisture] are. We’ll have to see if/where it comes up again after our dry summer heat.
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June 8, 2020 at 9:18 am
The warmth and moisture requirements will keep it from growing here. It’s either moist and cool, or hot and dry, but rarely hot and moist, so I think we’ll be spared this fungus.
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June 8, 2020 at 11:44 am
You’re right. You will very likely be spared.
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June 7, 2020 at 3:18 pm
Thanks for the education, Anneli. I’m looking out the window now at our neighbors pile of mulch.
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June 7, 2020 at 8:48 pm
And I’m looking out the window at mine – knowing I still have to finish distributing it!
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June 8, 2020 at 12:07 pm
Wow, that is a lot of bark!!! We don’t have trees like that here in Phoenix. They barely have bark haha.
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June 13, 2020 at 8:43 am
Maybe they could mulch cactus spines … but that would make weeding a bit annoying.
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June 13, 2020 at 5:14 am
Wow!!
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June 13, 2020 at 8:43 am
I’m realizing how much it is now that I have to unload and distribute it.
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June 13, 2020 at 7:02 pm
I know…
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