Fall Chores : Mulching

We're starting to wrap up our fall programming at school gardens already - this part of the year has flown by!  But in order to return to successful gardens in the spring, we have to put these gardens to bed the right way.

At Parkview, kids collected fallen leaves to mulch garden beds.  Mulching is important in the summer to hold moisture in the ground (you know, when its NOT raining!), and in the winter, mulching has an equally important function: protecting the plants from freezing, and feeding the soil as they decompose. Kids have helped collect leaves, break them up (so we don't get frozen sheets of leaves), and put them on garden beds.  We'll mulch the garlic beds that we have been planting so as those plants are dormant in the winter, they are warm and fed for some delicious spring and summer garlic.

Making sure that beds are mulched is a task that anyone can do in the fall, even without the help of a garden educator.  Here are a few great mulching resources!

Using Organic Matter in the Garden from Cornell University

What You Need to Know About Winter Mulch from Oregon Live

And for those of you thinking about jumping into the Food not Lawns approach in the spring, this video from Seattle Seedling is a great resource!  

You can also read about sheet mulching in more detail here.

If you're interested in all of this gardening information and think you want to know even more from some of the most knowledgable people in the Bellingham community, you should think about the Master Gardener Advanced Training on Monday, October 22nd!  We'll be there, too, so say hello and let us know you're reading!