Grow 101  ·  Creation Stewardship

Mulching and Sheet Mulching: Covering the Ground

Bare ground bakes, sheds water, and grows weeds. Covered ground does the opposite. Mulch is the cheapest change most gardens can make.

What mulch actually does

It holds moisture, moderates soil temperature, suppresses weeds, feeds fungi and worms as it breaks down, and stops rain from beating the surface into a crust.

Sheet mulching at scale

Mow rather than till. Lay overlapping cardboard, wet it thoroughly, then four to six inches of wood chips or straw on top. Leave it a season. What was compacted, weedy ground becomes plantable without a single pass of a tiller.

No-till, in one line

Every time you turn soil you burn organic matter and break the fungal network that moves water and nutrients. Cover instead of turn, and the soil does that work for you.

Dry-climate notes

Go thicker than the books say, keep mulch off plant stems, and wet the ground before you cover it. Dry mulch over dry soil will hold the drought in as happily as it holds moisture.

Creation Stewardship

To keep the ground is a plain instruction. Covering it is the plainest way to obey.