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 Spring is almost upon us and many Baton Rougeans will be opening up sheds and pulling on gardening gloves, ready to tackle the spring gardening season. One garden product that will find its way into many gardens this year is MULCH.
I want to make sure that you, Sierra Clubbers, know that the Delta Chapter of the Sierra Club, which includes your Ba-ton Rouge Group, is part of the Save Our Cypress Coali-tion, along with me, Lower Mississippi RIVERKEEPER.
Cypress Mulch is made out of the chipped-up wood of the Bald Cypress tree. What many people don't know is that the harvesting of Cypress trees for cypress mulch is permanently destroying Cypress-Tupelo swamps in Louisiana and other southern states. What we are finding is that once the Cypress trees are cut down, they are not coming back. As a mulch, Cypress mulch is not even that great. It is made of wood (cellulose), so it de-composes relatively quickly compared to bark mulch, which is partly cork. It also does not "knit" together as tightly as pine straw, which can be helpful in suppressing weeds and keeping the mulch in place. What it comes down to is that people use Cypress mulch because they like the way it looks. I hope you agree that our Cypress forests are too precious to sacrifice for an aesthetically-pleasing garden.So, if not Cypress mulch, then what? There are plenty of op-tions when it comes to mulch-ing your garden beds. The most healthy and sustainable mulch that is available, you may just be throwing away in the trash every year! Fallen leaves and grass clippings are great for enriching the soil in garden beds. Using leaf litter and grass clippings puts vital nutrients back into your garden soil, holds in moisture, and helps to suppress weed growth. It also reduces the amount of
material going to landfills, and it's free! |