I've been thinking about this Bart. We have been heavy mulchers generally,
having started trees with a comfrey barrier against Kikuyu grass, mowing the
grass sideways into the comfrey through the summer, chopping the comfrey
regularly, ending the season with a depth of really good litter breaking
down.
Our winters are generally dry.
But with some more woolly aphid on trees this last year [perhaps also
because the trees had gone unpruned and it was pretty dark and dank in
places] I had been thinking that we should, for plant/soil health, be
clearing away the litter in the winter, and letting the sun onto the ground
while the leaves are off.
Any thoughts on that.
Also, to have the effect that you point to, I imagine that you'd need to
have the mulch pretty well out to the drip line. Yes?
As I say, our place tends to be in a winter rain shadow. This is generally
pretty advantageous in avoiding mouldiness in winter.
It sounds like work to me, but maybe the smart thing would be to try to [a]
clear mulch at leaf fall [end of our May, into June] and get that material
into compost [b] water well late July, while putting down mulch again
(question for me - where from?), the watering being [1] to top up soil
moisture before the spring [2] add a bit more thermal inertia, to keep it
cooler longer [3] to be in under the mulch and stay there longer.
any thoughts? - Bart or others..
Dennis
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