Mulch

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Many gardeners leave their gardens unattended for a few days, only to return and find them overrun with weeds, leading to discouragement. Mulch can help prevent weeds from taking over your garden. This means you can spend more time enjoying your garden and less time pulling up unwanted plants. The best time to mulch is after the soil has warmed up and you are ready to start planting. In Zone 4 Canada, this is usually the second week of June if the weather has been warm and sunny. Use black plastic or landscape fabric to help speed up warming if it has been a cool, cloudy spring. Different mulches have various properties, but most of them perform the same basic functions. They all:

• keep the soil cool during the day and warm at night
• reduce the amount of water evaporation by 10 to 50%
• prevent weeds from germinating between the desired plants
• (some) improve the texture and fertility of the soil
• protect the soil from erosion or crusting due to rain
• benefit gardens with clay soil
• help keep you and your plants cleaner

soil conditioning caring showing

Kids' Valley Garden by Louise Larabie is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.