Mulch
Growing Garden Vegetables
Recommended
Mulch
Mulch enriches and protects soil, helping
to provide a better
growing environment. In your backyard Mulch
is one of the
simplest and most beneficial practices you can
use in the garden.
Mulch is simply a protective layer of a material
that is spread on
top of the soil. Mulch can either be
organic--such as grass
clippings, straw, bark chips, and similar
materials--or inorganic--
such as stones, brick chips, and plastic. Both
organic and inorganic mulches have numerous benefits.
Mulch benefits include:
• protects the soil from
erosion
• reduces compaction from the impact of heavy
rains
• conserves moisture, reducing the need for
frequent watering
• maintains a more even soil temperature
• prevents weed growth
• keeps fruits and vegetables clean
• keeps feet clean, allowing access to garden
even when damp
• provides a "finished" look to the garden
Without an abundant supply of suitable food it is just as impossible to grow good vegetables as it would be to train a winning football team on a diet of soda pop and angel cake. Without plenty of plant food, all the care, coddling, coaxing, cultivating, spraying and worrying you may give will avail little. The soil must be rich or the garden will be poor.
Plants take all their nourishment in the form of soups, and very weak ones at that. Plant food to be available must be soluble to the action of the feeding root tubes; and unless it is available it might, as far as the present benefiting of your garden is concerned, just as well not be there at all. Plants take up their food through innumerable and microscopic feeding rootlets, which possess the power of absorbing moisture, and furnishing it, distributed by the plant juices, or sap, to stem, branch, leaf, flower and fruit. There is one startling fact which may help to fix these things in your memory: it takes from 300 to 500 pounds of water to furnish food for the building of one pound of dry plant matter. You can see why plant food is not of much use unless it is available; and it is not available unless it is soluble.
Mulch
Mulch | Vegetable Garden Tips | Growing Garden Vegetables