I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros and
cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested in
personal experience.
Cheers
Liz

"Staycalm" wrote in message
I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros
and
cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested
in
personal experience.

I prefer pea straw or lucerne hay as it breaks down into good food for
soil biota after it's done it's job of protecting the soil. I don't
like plain hay - too weedy. Never tried sugar cane. Have used old
leaves too and they work well.

Farm1 wrote:
"Staycalm" wrote in message

I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros

and

cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested

in

personal experience.


I prefer pea straw or lucerne hay as it breaks down into good food for
soil biota after it's done it's job of protecting the soil. I don't
like plain hay - too weedy. Never tried sugar cane. Have used old
leaves too and they work well.


Re Pea straw, this has the advantage of also adding a few peas to the
mix, which flower nicely, as well as adding nitrogen to the
soil...w\then you dig them in if you want to.
Best shot to re liven up garden throw in a few hand fulls of peas in
very late winterand dig them in before planting your summer crop to
make soil even better for growing nitrogen loving plants. Has the
advantage of worms being attracted...

Staycalm wrote:
I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros and
cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested in
personal experience.

We jusy go with whatever is cheapest. Tend to prefer baled straw or
lucerne as it is chunckier and has more structure, which shelters
emerging seedlings a bit better

The chopped stuff in compressed plastic bags seem too fine and dusty to
me (lucerne). The fine stuff will probably break down faster.

"Staycalm" wrote in message
u...
I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros and
cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested in
personal experience.
Cheers
Liz
I live in Esperance WA
I go to the beach and get lots of sea weed
to round my veges and then dig it in an apply
more as needed.
It is one of the best mulches and soil builders.
cheers
Nancy

g'day liz,

they should all be good mulches, my favourite is the grass hay
mulches, have used sugar cane never used pea straw (never seen it
available). got concerns about the amount of chemical used in growing
sugar cane (plus around here some of the farms have been reported as
having fire ants on them). my reckoning is that the fodder grass hays
come from a variety of growing conditions so should have different
elements available and maybe more elements than say mono-cropped cane.

least wise i don't need to use fertilisers/manures in my gardens.



On Sun, 22 Oct 2006 12:42:59 +1000, "Staycalm"
wrote:

snipped
With peace and brightest of blessings,

len

--
"Be Content With What You Have And
May You Find Serenity and Tranquillity In
A World That You May Not Understand."

http://www.gardenlen.com

"Farm1" please@askifyouwannaknow wrote in message
...
"Staycalm" wrote in message
I am putting in my lovely veggie bed this weekend. What are the pros
and
cons of using hay, pea straw and sugar cane mulches? I'm interested
in
personal experience.

I prefer pea straw or lucerne hay as it breaks down into good food for
soil biota after it's done it's job of protecting the soil. I don't
like plain hay - too weedy. Never tried sugar cane. Have used old
leaves too and they work well.


We use sorghum SWMBO got 2 trailer loads yesterday. The bad news was that
she had to get it, as the bales (300kg ea) have broken and so the good
farmer no longer delivers at no charge for delivery or product. It got wet a
few years ago and he could not sell it, but our small gardening community
has been helping by lowering his stocks of it. Also breaks down well and
conditions the soil beaut.
Jim

Nancy wrote:
I live in Esperance WA
I go to the beach and get lots of sea weed
to round my veges and then dig it in an apply
more as needed.
It is one of the best mulches and soil builders.

Fabulous stuff, but be careful collecting it - I know someone
who was fined for collecting seaweed.

We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week
or two, then onto the garden. Fabulous stuff. You get peas
coming up, but they are easy to weed. I don't use wheat
traw much because of the weeds, and I don't think it has
much nutrient value. I wouldn't use hay - you don't know
what weeds you might get.

wrote in message

I wouldn't use hay - you don't know
what weeds you might get.

I agree. We bought in hay for the cattle one year and then got bloody
Patersons Curse all over the farm. It's taken about 10 years to get
rid of it. And stupidly, I used some of this same sodding hay in my
garden - grrrrrrr! Never again. It's now fusspot time for all my
mulch materials.

wrote:
Nancy wrote:

I live in Esperance WA
I go to the beach and get lots of sea weed
to round my veges and then dig it in an apply
more as needed.
It is one of the best mulches and soil builders.


Fabulous stuff, but be careful collecting it - I know someone
who was fined for collecting seaweed.

We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week

awww, cmom, your really useing rabbit fertiliser.

which I'm told is great for roses.


Do you have any floppsie, moppsie and cotton tail recipes?

We'd be keeping rabbits as meat, but swmbo continues to thwart this plan
by giving them names (not to mention the mixo every 5 years).

Terryc wrote:
wrote:
We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week

awww, cmom, your really useing rabbit fertiliser.

which I'm told is great for roses.

Marvellous machines for turning food into poo. The poo is pelletised,
so breaks down slowly, while the wee gives a bit of an instant burst
of nutrients. That is my theory, anyway. If you have rabbits or
chooks it probably makes good sense to cycle hay or straw
through the yard first.

Do you have any floppsie, moppsie and cotton tail recipes?

We'd be keeping rabbits as meat, but swmbo continues to thwart this plan
by giving them names (not to mention the mixo every 5 years).

Your wife gives the rabbits mixo?

My dad has 5 acres down at manjimup and he has always wanted to
keep rabbits for meat, but I try to discourage him. They really are
charming creatures. I reckon he should eat chickens instead. With
an incubator he could turn them out as fast as rabbits, and they eat
less, and can scrounge for themselves. Besides, I doubt his wife will
eat rabbit.

"Terryc" wrote in message
wrote:

We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week

which I'm told is great for roses.

Roses also love horse poop. I'd like to try bunny poo though.

We'd be keeping rabbits as meat, but swmbo continues to thwart this
plan
by giving them names

:-))) Never name your meals.

wrote:


Your wife gives the rabbits mixo?
Naah names. The golden rule is don't name what you want to eat.

The mixo seems to appear every 5 years. Horrible job to have to wring
their necks. I'd prefer to chloroform them but no one has it locally.

My dad has 5 acres down at manjimup and he has always wanted to
keep rabbits for meat, but I try to discourage him. They really are
charming creatures. I reckon he should eat chickens instead. With
an incubator he could turn them out as fast as rabbits, and they eat
less, and can scrounge for themselves. Besides, I doubt his wife will
eat rabbit.

They are a pretty efficent food to meat converter, plus you can do
things like building rolling cages, etc. You do need to feed them as
much dry as wet, which is a point most people forget.And if you really
want pets, then you start stroking the bunnies from day 2(depends on
friendliness of doe).

Actually, rabbits are naturally a more efficent food converter than
chickens. They also have the advantage of eating a lot more stuff and
not needing expensive feed like chooks.

"Farm1" please@askifyouwannaknow wrote in message
...
"Terryc" wrote in message
wrote:

We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week

which I'm told is great for roses.

Roses also love horse poop. I'd like to try bunny poo though.

We'd be keeping rabbits as meat, but swmbo continues to thwart this
plan
by giving them names

:-))) Never name your meals.



Not true....my parents used to have goats, and we always named the 'meat'
goats....BarbQ, Matty (they still have the rug) etc.....worked well.

"meeee" wrote in message
"Farm1" please@askifyouwannaknow wrote in message
"Terryc" wrote in message
wrote:

We use peastraw. It goes into the rabbit house for a week

which I'm told is great for roses.

Roses also love horse poop. I'd like to try bunny poo though.

We'd be keeping rabbits as meat, but swmbo continues to thwart
this
plan
by giving them names

:-))) Never name your meals.

Not true....my parents used to have goats, and we always named the
'meat'
goats....BarbQ, Matty (they still have the rug) etc.....worked well.

Well I was thinking more along the lines of names like 'Polly' or
'Clarabelle' etc but names like Sirloin or those you mentioned do work
OK. Mind you, I also think it helps to grow up in an environment
where it's well known that the cute babies all grow up to end up on a
plate.