Sheet Mulching?

[growmore]

 I came across this whilst browsing on mulching....
http://www.eco-action.org/dt/mulch.html
I wonder how good it would be against blight if tried on part of a plot?....
It seems a strange way to garden ..Whats your thoughts on it?..Jim

[growmore]

[Svea]

seems very interesting.
some of it is being practiced by many allotment gardeners already, but this is taking it to the extreme.

svea

[NattyEm]

In one of my book it shws a garden completely covered in carpet with plants planted through it.  Not quite the same as this though - I wonder if it works.  Shame there isn't a picture.

[gavin]

Makes double-digging sound like basking on a tropical beach!   :o :o :o  ;)

All best - Gavin

[newchangeling]

I think this is also known as lasagne gardening.  My partner's mum tried it in her garden because she can't dig so well and it worked brilliantly.

I thought I'd try it on a couple of beds doen the lottie this year as an experiment.

[wardy]

Me too new changeling.  I'm trying it as I have nothing done on my plot (due to back probs) and am going to try this method with spuds.  I have tried it on a small scale but minus the sheet mulch - I just emptied garden compost out my bin and then kept earthing up the spuds as they grew - again with garden compost.  The results were very good which was a bit of a surprise cos I have lots of slugs.  No digging either and they are easy to harvest as again there's no digging. 

I think this method's drawback is the amount of mulch material you need so working with others would help as you could produce more compost material

The DVD "The Allotment" does show this being done

[derbex]

Did something like this on some of my beds last year, cardboard followed by horse pooh. Grew courgettes, pumpkins, beans & spuds through it. They all grew well -but the spuds suffered from mice a lot, so this year they're going in the soil.

It's pretty much all gone in now and I will probably do some again as I'm running out of time to dig and still have a load of moving boxes.

Jeremy

[philcooper]

It doesn't start off to well.

If you follow the "The first step (see diagram) is to sprinkle a handful of lime and a handful of chicken manure (or any organic high nitrogen manure)" instruction you will finish up with lots of ammonia and no nitrogen left in the chiciken manure.

I couldn't find any evidence that any gardening experience existed in the makers of the site

Don't believe it just because it's on the web!!!

Phil

[derbex]

I sort of did this :

http://www.permaculture.co.uk/mag/Articles/Cardboard_Revolution.html

No lime and I used the free, virtually unrotted, horse manure we get on the site, rather than mushroom compost. It was more for weed suppression than growing stuff -but what I did plant grew :)

Jeremy

[Clayhithe]

Geoff mentions sheet mulching in his organic gardening book.

So I tried it last year.

It got very messy, and very slimy near the ground.   It never seemed to rot down,  and eventually I put it all on the compost heap.

The year before I mulched everything with newspaper.  It worked brilliantly around the raspberries and gooseberries,  and did eventually rot down.

I find that sheet mulching looks messy.   Now I'd rather compost everything and mulch with the compost.   I think hoeing keeps the weeds down better than sheet mulch.

[terrace max]

You've got to hand it to permaculturalists, they'll try anything to save the planet!

Another sheet mulch technique I read about involved spreading cardboard covered with grass clippings around your spuds at earthing-up time - instead of earthing up.

I'm tempted to try it this year because I find earthing-up a bit of a nuisance in my raised beds: there never seems to be enough soil! And it sounds like a good use for the acres of cardboard which stuff seems to come wrapped in...and the neighbours' grass cuttings...

Has anyone out there tried this??

[wardy]

No, but I'm going to  :)

[Clayhithe]

Another sheet mulch technique I read about involved spreading cardboard covered with grass clippings around your spuds at earthing-up time - instead of earthing up.

Has anyone out there tried this??

Yes,  it works well, but the cardboard takes a long time to rot down unless you tear it up and put it on the heap.

Don't make the grass cuttings layer too deep or it goes slimy.