anita wrote in
s.com:

can i buy mulch at garden centres.

You can do, but it is a lot cheaper to use garden compost (it doesn't have
to be completely rotted to make a good mulch), dead leaves, bracken, or
even lawn clippings (be careful not to pile these on very thick, or they
may start to ferment)

These mulches are mostly not very beautiful until they start to rot down
though, which I think is why people buy that 'mulching bark' from garden
centres.

If you have a shredder, shredded hedge clippings also make a good mulch,
and can look very neat. I tend to stick a layer over my other mulches so
people can see my efforts are deliberate!

After a while you get a nice thick buildup of rotted mulch (which the
plants like much better than my thin stony soil!)

It's also possible to use gravel as a mulch - that will help keep the soil
damp in the summer, but of course it doesn't rot down and add goodness to
the soil like the biodegradeable mulches do.

A handy tip I picked up here is to stick a layer of newspaper or cardboard
on a new bed first, then mulch over the top of it. That holds the weeds
down just long enough for the plants to get well established, then it rots
away and adds to the mulching effect.

Victoria