Wood chips are typically inexpensive, and they can be very useful around the yard and garden. You can find wood chips for sale from many landscaping and tree removal services (such as The Bushel Stop).
Use as Mulch
Put a layer of wood chips around the base of trees and in any flowerbeds or gardens to help improve the look of your yard and limit the amount of weeding you'll need to do. This mulch also helps keep the plants warm during cooler weather, limiting the risk that a short cold spell will damage them.
Limit Watering Needs
If you want to limit the amount of water you need to use to keep your landscaping healthy, consider adding a layer of wood chips. The wood chips help limit the amount of moisture that evaporates from the soil and may also absorb moisture from the air and add it to the soil they're covering, thus limiting the amount of extra watering you need to do to keep your gardens healthy.
Make Play Areas Safer
If you're putting up a swing set or other play structure in your yard, you'll probably want to put some type of surfacing material down first to make it safer should someone fall or jump off the equipment. This is a likely occurrence with kids. Options for this include sand, rubber tiles or mulch, pea gravel or wood chips.
Forming Paths
Wood chips are also an option for those who want to form paths through their landscaped backyard. If you're already using wood chips for mulch as part of your landscaping efforts, using them on paths as well can be an attractive choice. Just keep in mind that people with mobility issues may have trouble navigating these paths.
Add to a Compost Pile
Should you have extra wood chips, you can always add them to your compost pile. They help contribute carbon and work as part of the brown layer in the pile. They also help give the pile more structure and make it easier for air to move through the pile. Unless the wood chips are in very small pieces and mixed with materials high in nitrogen, such as grass clippings or manure, they will take quite a while to compost, however. They can take as long as two years to totally break down if there isn't much nitrogen in the compost pile. Aim for about 30 parts carbon-containing material, such as wood chips or paper, to 1 part nitrogen-containing material.
Share26 August 2015
My family enjoys eating produce of all kinds. Last year, we decided to grow our own produce during the summer to try to save some money on our grocery bill for the year. Our one problem that we had to find the solution for was making the most of the limited space that we have to grow a garden. This blog will show you how to grow a garden full of delicious produce even if you don't have a nice, big yard to use to create it. Hopefully, our experiences will help you find out how to garden when you have limited space.