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#1
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Rubber Mulch!!
Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden
department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#2
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Rubber Mulch!!
It is amusing to find bags of trash (ground up discarded tires) priced so
high. Has anyone tested this stuff for toxicity and long term effects in the garden? I would expect such mulch to raise the soil pH because of its high sulphur content and eventually make it too toxic to grow plants. I certainly wouldn't use it around vegetables and herbs or anything you intend to eat. What's next? Garden sculpture and bird baths made out of Tarmac? Vox Humana wrote in message ... Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#3
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Rubber Mulch!!
Correction: I meant that the high sulphur content would lower the soil pH by
degrading into sulfides and sulphates and making it too acidic. Cereoid-UR12 wrote in message gy.com... It is amusing to find bags of trash (ground up discarded tires) priced so high. Has anyone tested this stuff for toxicity and long term effects in the garden? I would expect such mulch to raise the soil pH because of its high sulphur content and eventually make it too toxic to grow plants. I certainly wouldn't use it around vegetables and herbs or anything you intend to eat. What's next? Garden sculpture and bird baths made out of Tarmac? Vox Humana wrote in message ... Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#4
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Rubber Mulch!!
"Cereoid-UR12" wrote in message gy.com... Correction: I meant that the high sulphur content would lower the soil pH by degrading into sulfides and sulphates and making it too acidic. Looks like zinc toxicity might be problematic, also. http://www.agr.state.nc.us/../agronomi/rubber.htm Jo |
#5
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Rubber Mulch!!
This is not a new product, it's been around for 20+ years. It's original use
was for playgrounds. Instead of the blacktop or concrete for the kiddies to hurl themselves onto from the play equipment they put this stuff down so they would bounce a bit and not bleed quite so profusely. It was also supposed to have gone down on paths and walk ways, easier on the shoes and body than gravel, mud, etc. Horse arenas were also another target customer. This is the first I have heard of it for sometime. It sort of disappeared from public as far as I can tell. Perhaps it was a bust for it's former uses and now they are touting this material as garden mulch and somebody has a warehouse full of this stuff and they are trying to get rid of it........... AGAIN. Val "Vox Humana" wrote in message ... Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#6
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Rubber Mulch!!
One of the things I like best about the shredded mulch that we use is that
it turns into rich, black dirt in a year or two. I have the deepest, blackest and most fertile beds because of the compost action of the mulch. Earthworm city -- they love it. Yes, it does mean that I have to put more mulch on each year -- but that's maybe only an afternoon or two of work -- and what a great way to get nice soil! I can't imagine the lava rock (or the rubber) being anywhere near as good. Yes, it would last longer -- forever, I guess. But what a waste of opportunity for making more fertile soil! -- -- pelirojaroja "dangerous redhead" "Vox Humana" wrote in message ... Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#7
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Rubber Mulch!!
Since it is organic, even rubber is eventually biodegradable by the actions
of bacteria. Seen it happen in landfills. However, I would not want to use what results as a soil for growing plants. The stuff is apparently toxic and most weeds won't even grow in it. How did ground rubber get approved for use as mulch anyway? pelirojaroja wrote in message ... One of the things I like best about the shredded mulch that we use is that it turns into rich, black dirt in a year or two. I have the deepest, blackest and most fertile beds because of the compost action of the mulch. Earthworm city -- they love it. Yes, it does mean that I have to put more mulch on each year -- but that's maybe only an afternoon or two of work -- and what a great way to get nice soil! I can't imagine the lava rock (or the rubber) being anywhere near as good. Yes, it would last longer -- forever, I guess. But what a waste of opportunity for making more fertile soil! -- -- pelirojaroja "dangerous redhead" "Vox Humana" wrote in message ... Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. The label touted the fact that you would only have to use this product once, unlike conventional mulch that has to be applied every year or two. Someone use that pine nugget mulch on some of the beds at my house and it never seems to disappear no matter how hard I try to rid myself of it. I can't even imagine using rubber. What happens when you need to plant something? It seems you would have to carefully remove it if you wanted to improve the soil. Oh well, I guess it probably isn't any worse than the red volcanic rock than the people up the street use around their shrubs - or is it? |
#8
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Rubber Mulch!!
Amazing.
The studys say outright that ground rubber is unsuitable for growing plants and using it results in high levels of zinc that are toxic to plants. The stuff should be pulled from the store shelves immediately. Lowes did not do their homework before considering selling the stuff to the public. They are leaving themselves wide open to being sued for selling toxic material!! jo wrote in message . com... "Cereoid-UR12" wrote in message gy.com... Correction: I meant that the high sulphur content would lower the soil pH by degrading into sulfides and sulphates and making it too acidic. Looks like zinc toxicity might be problematic, also. http://www.agr.state.nc.us/../agronomi/rubber.htm Jo |
#9
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Rubber Mulch!!
In article om,
"Cereoid-UR12" wrote: It is amusing to find bags of trash (ground up discarded tires) priced so high. Has anyone tested this stuff for toxicity and long term effects in the garden? Ground up rubber tires have most certainly been tested as soil enrichment, & not been found very thrilling. All seriously independent studies recommend NOT using recycled tires in compost & fertilizer products because these studies show that its use & re-use raises the zinc level to harmful levels sufficient to kill plants. There are other accumulative side-effects that would warn against using ground rubber in compost mixes. But if all secondary problems are"excused", the zinc, cadmium, & other heavy metals factor is alone too enormous to be rationally overlooked. It does have a slight (very slight) nitrogen value. Rufus Chaney of the USDA following the research for 20 years stated that the MAJORITY of research leads to the conclusion that for the Zn factor alone, ground or chipped rubber should never be used in gardens or composts. Nevertheless, rubber IS an undisclosed ingredient in many commercially packaged composts. The nutritional value is so slight it is really a very poor choice even were it not toxic, but it IS also potentially toxic. As one might suspect, the attempt to find garden uses is inspired not by a desire to improve horticultural & agricultural techniques, but by adesparation to get rid of a type of trash that our culture generates by the millions of tons & cannot easily discard. Political & economic pressures have been brought to bare even on horticultural research projects. Governments INSTRUCT research fascilities to find SOME useful value for used tires, then industry makes the research itself profitable (via grants provided from the petroleum, chemical, & rubber industries) -- so that studies are set up specifically to find something good to say about this crud, & to come up with findings that will assist industry in profiting itself by their waste products, rather than incurring any expenses of disposal. Even the Northeast Recycle Council (NERC) has been successfully coopted by the rubber industry -- under pretense of being a watchdog & research non-profit, NERC has been promoting all kinds of ideas profitable to the rubber industry. In their own minds they are not sell-outs; they have sincerely convinced itself that the enormous problem of used tire waste MUST be solved in a profitable manner or it will never be solved at all -- & duping themselves, & us, into believing it's great stuff for the gardens, heavy metal content & all, has ruined them as a credible organization. When they promote "buy recycled products!" it may well turn out to be something toxic for an inappropriate use, but soft-touch ecologists are apt to buy into it. Rufus Chaney is unambiguous: "It may look like good money, but rubber-Zn will ruin the compost product." Yet SOME value for this crud is being established. The toxic factors are increasingly & intentionally NOT part of the studies, & even if the best a study can show is that rubber kills stuff, that is shaped even by the resarchers to help industrial PR people tranform the finding into proof that it makes a great weed-suppressing mulch. The problem of synthetics chemical toxic gasses released from ground up rubber is dismissed because nobody was ever asphyxiated by these gasses, & really it is only a problem of the hideous stench of these gases on any hot day. (But at least one study showed that "volatile organic compounds" -- meaning chemical organics -- were sufficiently toxic that products with ground rubber should not be used in enclosed areas or indoors as a human health hazard) Industry can "spin" even the worst finding. When the industry is told "zinc in crumb rubber toxifies soil especially with repeat usage," their smiling faces reply, "The zinc content is beneficial to zinc deficient topsoils." When it is found that crumb rubber "kills flowers," it becomes "retards weeds." And so on. It is now being VERY successfully marketed sterile top-coating to suppress weeds, & apparently can LOOK loamy even though its rubber. "Crumb rubber for weed control" is a phrase that is going to be tried on us more & more, & if it succeeds, this crud WILL become a fundamental product from the same sorts of outfits who brought us so many garden poisons with happy-faces attached. Crumb rubber mulch is marketed by Rubber Resources of Florida under the brand name Everlast (great name -- admits you can never get this crud back out of the environment), & by YardCo (also of Florida). The "testing" has been done by the companies themselves -- the test garden in Hudson Florida called Garden World Nursery is owned by Rubber Resources & is "display propoganda" rather than oriented toward credible controled study; & of coruse they're not claiming it has any actual value except for covering up the soil. There's a strongly propogandistic attempt to convince organic gardeners that by participating in recycling of this nature they are really good liberals & such -- but for the average gardener who puts poisons on their garden all the time, the market is already guaranteed. YardCo promises their cedar-colored rubber particles are "95% steel free!" Most such products don't even make that laughable boast. It's no accident that Florida, the Carolinas, & Arkansas are the places where this stuff first gained "popularity" or was first marketed successfully. Waste Management Acts in southern states acknowledges that the #1 waste management problem was rubber tires. They encouraged novel & creative uses, & they provided the first markets for these novel products. South Carolina's Three Rivers Solid Waste Authority was the first major client for rubber waste dumped over great areas of land at highway rest stops. The SC Department of Health & Environmental Control's Office of Solid Waste Reduction & Recycling put their own PR department to work promoting a potentially harmful waste product as the ultimate solution to the problem of used tire disposal. If the rubber barrons can get local government to do their propoganda for them, how much nicer it all works out for Industry! A three year study in South Carolina was an amazing white-wash job. The primary "plus" was that county & state laborers & groundkeepers liked the stuff because it lessened the amount of work they had to do, since the stuff never leaves the environment the way organic products do. This is a little like giving a clean bill of health to Sterno because tramps said it was good to drink. Although the PR spin was that "no problems were reported," the study did note (as an unimportant aside) that rubber mulch did kill all the flowers in summer, & it smelled bad on hot days, but the important factors for its continued use was it was permanent in the environment & it kept its color. When studies are arranged to assess how long it lasts without fading, rather than how it harms the environment, really great things can be said about it! South Carolina's waste management agency even went out of its way to promote the product in other states & spread the project to kill the flowers & stink up the rest stops all across the continent -- they already hadtheir own state's waste tires ready to ship. The South Carolina study also found that producing this stuff is one of the most expensive uses of public funds. But was that a negative? Certainly not! Because they could charge every tire buyer a special tax on every tire sold in the state, & because the stuff was permanent in the environment, in the "long view" it was actually PROFITABLE to raise taxes to fund a project that would spoil the environment. It may sound so irrational that it's hard to believe, but the #1 waste management problem is those tires, & that fact colors the attitudes of government agencies responsible for finding SOME way to get rid of tires, since taking them back to the manufacture to recycle into new tires was ruled out decades ago & the government agreed to pick up after the industry one way or another, under threat of the industry going to some third world locality (like Georgia) to do their damage. When the idea that it was a good sterile mulch that didn't HAVE to benefit plants to be a Really Really Good Thing, they were really onto something marketable. They got child safety people on their side, government waste management people, recycle environmentists -- the rubber industry greased the palms of many activist organizations & university departments to focus on this one aspect & stop damning the stuff for its negative effect on loam values. When the Arkansas Attorney General RECOMMENDED rubber mulch for state playgrounds & parks, it was because Davis Rubber was a local employer -- all politics & profit, NOT inherent value. When a University study is NOT bought & paid for by industry (such as Ellen Harrison's research at Cornell University Waste Management Institute), the condemnation of rubber being strewn into the gardening environment is entirely clear, & the industry never sites truly independent findings. Richard Evans of the Horticultural Extension of Davis University in California put the best spin he could on his study of potting soils made with crumb rubber. All glowy-eyed in one interview he said how really well the chrystanthemums grew in this potting medium, saying "It works pretty well. It has some nice properties." Pressed for details, he was little less happily to admit, "The only problem was, the zinc content began to kill the chrysanthemums." It took ONE WEEK for the plants to show evidence of toxification & browning leaves. And that wasn't even with repeat use -- just one good dose of crumb rubber & kaput. How could he interpret that in any way as "a nice property" when it resulted inevitably in rapid plant decline? Check the funding source, the answer will be there. AlternaMulch brand BOASTS that this stuff won't break down in the environment in a CENTURY. This is supposedto be good! Other brands include Rubberific, Homestead Rubber Mulch, Soft Landing, Pour-N, RubberStuff, a host of others. So clearly the market is broad, & this stuff is being dumped into the environment by the millions of tons as landscape feature. Most do not pretend it benefits gardens; rather, they are trying to horn in on the woodchip & shavings marketplace to coat playgrounds & carnival & state fair grounds or picnic areas. But some of it is packaged to be used as a general garden mulch. ALL the comnpanies in this relatively new industry of selling rubber particles as mulch often cites as vaguely as possible a Pennsylvania State University study as though it lauded the product. But that study made NO evaluation of the effects (good or bad) on gardens; it merely showed that if you fall down on rubber it hurts less than if you fall down on sticks or rocks. Woopy. In fertilizers per se the inroads have been less effective. Most rubber nowadays is synthetic; the chemical, petroleum, & rubber industries are hardly to be distinguished. And these conglomerates already dominate chemical fertilizer industry big-time. When pressured by the government to do something about the growing problem of used tire disposal, making ignorant gardeners buy it one way or another remains the #1 priority -- then a problem becomes a profit. If it ultimately leads to other problems, who cares, it solves an immediate problem while assisting rather than harming industry profits. Government assistance to the rubber industry is even more absurd in some other countries. In Malaysia all government rubber policies are oriented toward benefiting the sizeable rubber industry, which has resulted in a considerable problem of waste tires since it does not benefit the industry to make them address such thorny problems. So the government encouraged the public to buy & use a recycled rubber fuel which completely fouled the atmosphere. A bakery used it for their ovens until public outcry against rubber-flavored breads & pastries made them stop. I don't think this project is still going on, it was an embarrassment to all. But just about all uses that are being found for old tires has the same underlying philosophy that the environment does not count as much as do industrial profits. The REAL answer is to formulate & manufacture tires in such a manner that they are recyclable into making new tires out of old ones; as presently formulated this is impossible, & neither the oil tycoons nor the rubber barons want this to change because it is more profitable to keep providing new raw materials. The Horticultural Research Center in Carbondale found that a medium that was 20% ground or scraped rubber tires sustained evenly green lawns, plus (no joke) it gave the ground "bounce," so that it was actually being recommended for turfs on which chilren & adults play sports. Southern Illinois University actually developed such a rubber-medium turf in 1998 & it is still in use for campus sports. But note that the recommendation was exclusively for turf, not gardening, & the comparison was between rubber medium, and sand, rather than to any sort of balanced topsoil. In essence the nutritional value was negligible, but moisture retention was improved when rubber was compared to sand. Since the American public at least isn't buying the idea that crumb rubber is a fertilizer, recycled bits have been slipped into products only as "bulking agent." Ingredient labels on commercial composts don't have to say the bulking agent is ground-up tires, so people who do not carefully seek out trustworthy organic products may already be using tire particles in their gardens without knowing it. And for a one-time use the dangers are so slight as to be (in the industrial way of thinking) unworthy of note. The problems arise when recycled rubber is in LOTS of products (whether or not we know it) or when composts with rubber bulking agents are used repeatedly in a given area or when it is doubled-up with rubber mulch, insuring the Zn factor of injury to the soil, & the nearly irreversible problem of slow decay or break-down of rubber in the formulas. Since the only even moderate stamp of approval for landscaping has been as a mulch to fall on & not get hurt, this has been the greatest focus of use. But since the industry also wants it to be used for general gardening, the University of Arkansas did some testing to see if, within the limited value as a sterile mulch, it causes any harm. Unfortunately the Horticultural department was HIRED by Davis Rubber Company, so it cannot be mistaken for an independent study. University of Florida also took funding from Florida rubber mulch manufacturers to "prove" something positive about it -- though whimsically their "best" spin in the products favor was only that it was good for permanent landscape features where a landscaper wanted nothing to grow, & even at that they recommended it be mixed with gravel to limit this lightweight crud's migration into areas where it might cause harm. As a soil enrichment per se no study praises it. Yet "crumb rubber" is in the marketplace now with recommendations to be included in garden products. If even a small percentage could be included in a popular brand, it'd increase the profits to the manufacturer of the product & benefit the rubber industry besides. Serious value to gardening is a secondary issue; they'll end up using this stuff at least as padding if it is profitable. And people have already bought into the idea of ground up packing peanuts strewn through the soil, so why not rubber if some of the same claims can be made for it PLUS it has an eency weency nutritional value vermiculite lacks. Easy inroads are also being made in other countries. In Argentina, crumb rubber is alleged to be "natural" or "organic" fertilizer, since rubber is presumedly a tree product to start with, conveniently overlooking the fact that tires have not been manufactured from pure rubber for decades. Crumb rubber plants are being opened in almost every state of the union because government has accepted this as the best answer to a solid waste problem with the economic side-benefits of more jobs. Many a so-called "environmental" project can be turned into an opportunity to spread out more crumb rubber -- it's being used in wetlands "restoration" projects for example, vast amounts of tire waste dumped into wetlands despite studies that show it only takes one week to start killing plants. The best we can hope for is that organic gardening will become so widespread that the governmental & industrial desire to dupe us all & sell us stuff to injure the environment will in the long run fail. So far, it looks like they're having a rousing success. -paghat the ratgirl I would expect such mulch to raise the soil pH because of its high sulphur content and eventually make it too toxic to grow plants. I certainly wouldn't use it around vegetables and herbs or anything you intend to eat. What's next? Garden sculpture and bird baths made out of Tarmac? -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
#10
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Rubber Mulch!!
In article 1052411307.685820@yasure, "Valkyrie" wrote:
This is not a new product, it's been around for 20+ years. It's original use was for playgrounds. Instead of the blacktop or concrete for the kiddies to hurl themselves onto from the play equipment they put this stuff down so they would bounce a bit and not bleed quite so profusely. It was also supposed to have gone down on paths and walk ways, easier on the shoes and body than gravel, mud, etc. Horse arenas were also another target customer. This is the first I have heard of it for sometime. It sort of disappeared from public as far as I can tell. Perhaps it was a bust for it's former uses and now they are touting this material as garden mulch and somebody has a warehouse full of this stuff and they are trying to get rid of it........... AGAIN. Val Actually it's been around for 50 years & was initially a Cornell research product for soil ammendments. When they could not find a way to use it safely (& never mind it is now a common UNsafe bulking agent in commercial composts), the playground use was the later back-up plan, & was indeed where the first commercial inroads occurred. -paghat the ratgirl -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
#11
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Rubber Mulch!!
In article , "pelirojaroja"
wrote: One of the things I like best about the shredded mulch that we use is that it turns into rich, black dirt in a year or two. I have the deepest, blackest and most fertile beds because of the compost action of the mulch. Earthworm city -- they love it. Yes, it does mean that I have to put more mulch on each year -- but that's maybe only an afternoon or two of work -- and what a great way to get nice soil! I can't imagine the lava rock (or the rubber) being anywhere near as good. Yes, it would last longer -- forever, I guess. But what a waste of opportunity for making more fertile soil! Absolutely right, & yet the industry "spin" is that unlike those awful natural mulches that rot away into horrible humus forcing you to put down more mulch, rubber mulch lasts FOREVER so saves you MONEY and saves you LABOR, so surely you MUST use rubber instead. -paghat the ratgirl -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
#12
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Rubber Mulch!!
In article , "Cereoid-UR12"
wrote: Since it is organic, even rubber is eventually biodegradable by the actions of bacteria. Seen it happen in landfills. However, I would not want to use what results as a soil for growing plants. The stuff is apparently toxic and most weeds won't even grow in it. How did ground rubber get approved for use as mulch anyway? The government prioritized certain problems this way: 1) The foremost waste management problem in America is what to do with waste tires. One way or another it MUST be taken care of, but: 2) We're an automobile related society and whatever the answer to problem may be, it must foremost be compatible with having more & more automobiles. 3) If the tire industry is forced to spend money to clean up a problem the industry causes, the industry will be ****ed off & move to Indonesia, where for a fee millions upon millions of used tires have already been accepted from Malaysia & Thailand & the Philipines, turned into enormous mountains of waste rubber. 4) If the public can be inducedto PAY MONEY to obtain bags full of ground up tires, it could be PROFITABLE rather than economic burden to have all these bothersome used tires about. 5) If the environment is harmed by this "solution," the harm has to be weighted against the positives of doing away with the waste & adding to rather than subtracting from the economic environment. 6) Sure, this "solution" creates another environmental hazard. But even bad news can be worded to sound like good news, & that's all that matters. -paghat the ratgirl -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
#13
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Rubber Mulch!!
In article ,
"Cereoid-UR12" wrote: Amazing. The studys say outright that ground rubber is unsuitable for growing plants and using it results in high levels of zinc that are toxic to plants. The stuff should be pulled from the store shelves immediately. Lowes did not do their homework before considering selling the stuff to the public. They are leaving themselves wide open to being sued for selling toxic material!! Crumb rubber as bulking agent does not have to be listed as "crumb rubber" in the packaging details, but only as bulking agent or some other imprecise listing. It's in so many products already that marketing some of it openly as crumb rubber isn't going to get Lowes sued. Government agencies are encouraging these uses, & several environmental agencies have become little more than shills to further promote these unsuitable products. -paghat the ratgirl -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
#14
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Rubber Mulch!!
Not thrilling?
It turns out the stuff is TOXIC!!!!! I find that rather frightening and am amazed that the stuff is being sold at all. It should be promptly removed from the shelves and BANNED!!!! paghat wrote in message news In article om, "Cereoid-UR12" wrote: It is amusing to find bags of trash (ground up discarded tires) priced so high. Has anyone tested this stuff for toxicity and long term effects in the garden? Ground up rubber tires have most certainly been tested as soil enrichment, & not been found very thrilling. All seriously independent studies recommend NOT using recycled tires in compost & fertilizer products because these studies show that its use & re-use raises the zinc level to harmful levels sufficient to kill plants. There are other accumulative side-effects that would warn against using ground rubber in compost mixes. But if all secondary problems are"excused", the zinc, cadmium, & other heavy metals factor is alone too enormous to be rationally overlooked. It does have a slight (very slight) nitrogen value. Rufus Chaney of the USDA following the research for 20 years stated that the MAJORITY of research leads to the conclusion that for the Zn factor alone, ground or chipped rubber should never be used in gardens or composts. Nevertheless, rubber IS an undisclosed ingredient in many commercially packaged composts. The nutritional value is so slight it is really a very poor choice even were it not toxic, but it IS also potentially toxic. As one might suspect, the attempt to find garden uses is inspired not by a desire to improve horticultural & agricultural techniques, but by adesparation to get rid of a type of trash that our culture generates by the millions of tons & cannot easily discard. Political & economic pressures have been brought to bare even on horticultural research projects. Governments INSTRUCT research fascilities to find SOME useful value for used tires, then industry makes the research itself profitable (via grants provided from the petroleum, chemical, & rubber industries) -- so that studies are set up specifically to find something good to say about this crud, & to come up with findings that will assist industry in profiting itself by their waste products, rather than incurring any expenses of disposal. Even the Northeast Recycle Council (NERC) has been successfully coopted by the rubber industry -- under pretense of being a watchdog & research non-profit, NERC has been promoting all kinds of ideas profitable to the rubber industry. In their own minds they are not sell-outs; they have sincerely convinced itself that the enormous problem of used tire waste MUST be solved in a profitable manner or it will never be solved at all -- & duping themselves, & us, into believing it's great stuff for the gardens, heavy metal content & all, has ruined them as a credible organization. When they promote "buy recycled products!" it may well turn out to be something toxic for an inappropriate use, but soft-touch ecologists are apt to buy into it. Rufus Chaney is unambiguous: "It may look like good money, but rubber-Zn will ruin the compost product." Yet SOME value for this crud is being established. The toxic factors are increasingly & intentionally NOT part of the studies, & even if the best a study can show is that rubber kills stuff, that is shaped even by the resarchers to help industrial PR people tranform the finding into proof that it makes a great weed-suppressing mulch. The problem of synthetics chemical toxic gasses released from ground up rubber is dismissed because nobody was ever asphyxiated by these gasses, & really it is only a problem of the hideous stench of these gases on any hot day. (But at least one study showed that "volatile organic compounds" -- meaning chemical organics -- were sufficiently toxic that products with ground rubber should not be used in enclosed areas or indoors as a human health hazard) Industry can "spin" even the worst finding. When the industry is told "zinc in crumb rubber toxifies soil especially with repeat usage," their smiling faces reply, "The zinc content is beneficial to zinc deficient topsoils." When it is found that crumb rubber "kills flowers," it becomes "retards weeds." And so on. It is now being VERY successfully marketed sterile top-coating to suppress weeds, & apparently can LOOK loamy even though its rubber. "Crumb rubber for weed control" is a phrase that is going to be tried on us more & more, & if it succeeds, this crud WILL become a fundamental product from the same sorts of outfits who brought us so many garden poisons with happy-faces attached. Crumb rubber mulch is marketed by Rubber Resources of Florida under the brand name Everlast (great name -- admits you can never get this crud back out of the environment), & by YardCo (also of Florida). The "testing" has been done by the companies themselves -- the test garden in Hudson Florida called Garden World Nursery is owned by Rubber Resources & is "display propoganda" rather than oriented toward credible controled study; & of coruse they're not claiming it has any actual value except for covering up the soil. There's a strongly propogandistic attempt to convince organic gardeners that by participating in recycling of this nature they are really good liberals & such -- but for the average gardener who puts poisons on their garden all the time, the market is already guaranteed. YardCo promises their cedar-colored rubber particles are "95% steel free!" Most such products don't even make that laughable boast. It's no accident that Florida, the Carolinas, & Arkansas are the places where this stuff first gained "popularity" or was first marketed successfully. Waste Management Acts in southern states acknowledges that the #1 waste management problem was rubber tires. They encouraged novel & creative uses, & they provided the first markets for these novel products. South Carolina's Three Rivers Solid Waste Authority was the first major client for rubber waste dumped over great areas of land at highway rest stops. The SC Department of Health & Environmental Control's Office of Solid Waste Reduction & Recycling put their own PR department to work promoting a potentially harmful waste product as the ultimate solution to the problem of used tire disposal. If the rubber barrons can get local government to do their propoganda for them, how much nicer it all works out for Industry! A three year study in South Carolina was an amazing white-wash job. The primary "plus" was that county & state laborers & groundkeepers liked the stuff because it lessened the amount of work they had to do, since the stuff never leaves the environment the way organic products do. This is a little like giving a clean bill of health to Sterno because tramps said it was good to drink. Although the PR spin was that "no problems were reported," the study did note (as an unimportant aside) that rubber mulch did kill all the flowers in summer, & it smelled bad on hot days, but the important factors for its continued use was it was permanent in the environment & it kept its color. When studies are arranged to assess how long it lasts without fading, rather than how it harms the environment, really great things can be said about it! South Carolina's waste management agency even went out of its way to promote the product in other states & spread the project to kill the flowers & stink up the rest stops all across the continent -- they already hadtheir own state's waste tires ready to ship. The South Carolina study also found that producing this stuff is one of the most expensive uses of public funds. But was that a negative? Certainly not! Because they could charge every tire buyer a special tax on every tire sold in the state, & because the stuff was permanent in the environment, in the "long view" it was actually PROFITABLE to raise taxes to fund a project that would spoil the environment. It may sound so irrational that it's hard to believe, but the #1 waste management problem is those tires, & that fact colors the attitudes of government agencies responsible for finding SOME way to get rid of tires, since taking them back to the manufacture to recycle into new tires was ruled out decades ago & the government agreed to pick up after the industry one way or another, under threat of the industry going to some third world locality (like Georgia) to do their damage. When the idea that it was a good sterile mulch that didn't HAVE to benefit plants to be a Really Really Good Thing, they were really onto something marketable. They got child safety people on their side, government waste management people, recycle environmentists -- the rubber industry greased the palms of many activist organizations & university departments to focus on this one aspect & stop damning the stuff for its negative effect on loam values. When the Arkansas Attorney General RECOMMENDED rubber mulch for state playgrounds & parks, it was because Davis Rubber was a local employer -- all politics & profit, NOT inherent value. When a University study is NOT bought & paid for by industry (such as Ellen Harrison's research at Cornell University Waste Management Institute), the condemnation of rubber being strewn into the gardening environment is entirely clear, & the industry never sites truly independent findings. Richard Evans of the Horticultural Extension of Davis University in California put the best spin he could on his study of potting soils made with crumb rubber. All glowy-eyed in one interview he said how really well the chrystanthemums grew in this potting medium, saying "It works pretty well. It has some nice properties." Pressed for details, he was little less happily to admit, "The only problem was, the zinc content began to kill the chrysanthemums." It took ONE WEEK for the plants to show evidence of toxification & browning leaves. And that wasn't even with repeat use -- just one good dose of crumb rubber & kaput. How could he interpret that in any way as "a nice property" when it resulted inevitably in rapid plant decline? Check the funding source, the answer will be there. AlternaMulch brand BOASTS that this stuff won't break down in the environment in a CENTURY. This is supposedto be good! Other brands include Rubberific, Homestead Rubber Mulch, Soft Landing, Pour-N, RubberStuff, a host of others. So clearly the market is broad, & this stuff is being dumped into the environment by the millions of tons as landscape feature. Most do not pretend it benefits gardens; rather, they are trying to horn in on the woodchip & shavings marketplace to coat playgrounds & carnival & state fair grounds or picnic areas. But some of it is packaged to be used as a general garden mulch. ALL the comnpanies in this relatively new industry of selling rubber particles as mulch often cites as vaguely as possible a Pennsylvania State University study as though it lauded the product. But that study made NO evaluation of the effects (good or bad) on gardens; it merely showed that if you fall down on rubber it hurts less than if you fall down on sticks or rocks. Woopy. In fertilizers per se the inroads have been less effective. Most rubber nowadays is synthetic; the chemical, petroleum, & rubber industries are hardly to be distinguished. And these conglomerates already dominate chemical fertilizer industry big-time. When pressured by the government to do something about the growing problem of used tire disposal, making ignorant gardeners buy it one way or another remains the #1 priority -- then a problem becomes a profit. If it ultimately leads to other problems, who cares, it solves an immediate problem while assisting rather than harming industry profits. Government assistance to the rubber industry is even more absurd in some other countries. In Malaysia all government rubber policies are oriented toward benefiting the sizeable rubber industry, which has resulted in a considerable problem of waste tires since it does not benefit the industry to make them address such thorny problems. So the government encouraged the public to buy & use a recycled rubber fuel which completely fouled the atmosphere. A bakery used it for their ovens until public outcry against rubber-flavored breads & pastries made them stop. I don't think this project is still going on, it was an embarrassment to all. But just about all uses that are being found for old tires has the same underlying philosophy that the environment does not count as much as do industrial profits. The REAL answer is to formulate & manufacture tires in such a manner that they are recyclable into making new tires out of old ones; as presently formulated this is impossible, & neither the oil tycoons nor the rubber barons want this to change because it is more profitable to keep providing new raw materials. The Horticultural Research Center in Carbondale found that a medium that was 20% ground or scraped rubber tires sustained evenly green lawns, plus (no joke) it gave the ground "bounce," so that it was actually being recommended for turfs on which chilren & adults play sports. Southern Illinois University actually developed such a rubber-medium turf in 1998 & it is still in use for campus sports. But note that the recommendation was exclusively for turf, not gardening, & the comparison was between rubber medium, and sand, rather than to any sort of balanced topsoil. In essence the nutritional value was negligible, but moisture retention was improved when rubber was compared to sand. Since the American public at least isn't buying the idea that crumb rubber is a fertilizer, recycled bits have been slipped into products only as "bulking agent." Ingredient labels on commercial composts don't have to say the bulking agent is ground-up tires, so people who do not carefully seek out trustworthy organic products may already be using tire particles in their gardens without knowing it. And for a one-time use the dangers are so slight as to be (in the industrial way of thinking) unworthy of note. The problems arise when recycled rubber is in LOTS of products (whether or not we know it) or when composts with rubber bulking agents are used repeatedly in a given area or when it is doubled-up with rubber mulch, insuring the Zn factor of injury to the soil, & the nearly irreversible problem of slow decay or break-down of rubber in the formulas. Since the only even moderate stamp of approval for landscaping has been as a mulch to fall on & not get hurt, this has been the greatest focus of use. But since the industry also wants it to be used for general gardening, the University of Arkansas did some testing to see if, within the limited value as a sterile mulch, it causes any harm. Unfortunately the Horticultural department was HIRED by Davis Rubber Company, so it cannot be mistaken for an independent study. University of Florida also took funding from Florida rubber mulch manufacturers to "prove" something positive about it -- though whimsically their "best" spin in the products favor was only that it was good for permanent landscape features where a landscaper wanted nothing to grow, & even at that they recommended it be mixed with gravel to limit this lightweight crud's migration into areas where it might cause harm. As a soil enrichment per se no study praises it. Yet "crumb rubber" is in the marketplace now with recommendations to be included in garden products. If even a small percentage could be included in a popular brand, it'd increase the profits to the manufacturer of the product & benefit the rubber industry besides. Serious value to gardening is a secondary issue; they'll end up using this stuff at least as padding if it is profitable. And people have already bought into the idea of ground up packing peanuts strewn through the soil, so why not rubber if some of the same claims can be made for it PLUS it has an eency weency nutritional value vermiculite lacks. Easy inroads are also being made in other countries. In Argentina, crumb rubber is alleged to be "natural" or "organic" fertilizer, since rubber is presumedly a tree product to start with, conveniently overlooking the fact that tires have not been manufactured from pure rubber for decades. Crumb rubber plants are being opened in almost every state of the union because government has accepted this as the best answer to a solid waste problem with the economic side-benefits of more jobs. Many a so-called "environmental" project can be turned into an opportunity to spread out more crumb rubber -- it's being used in wetlands "restoration" projects for example, vast amounts of tire waste dumped into wetlands despite studies that show it only takes one week to start killing plants. The best we can hope for is that organic gardening will become so widespread that the governmental & industrial desire to dupe us all & sell us stuff to injure the environment will in the long run fail. So far, it looks like they're having a rousing success. -paghat the ratgirl I would expect such mulch to raise the soil pH because of its high sulphur content and eventually make it too toxic to grow plants. I certainly wouldn't use it around vegetables and herbs or anything you intend to eat. What's next? Garden sculpture and bird baths made out of Tarmac? -- "Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher. "Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature. -from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers" See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/ |
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Rubber Mulch!!
"Vox Humana" wrote:
Maybe I don't get out much, but a few days ago I was browsing the garden department at Lowe's and found some bags of rubber mulch. It was quite expensive - around $10 for 2 cubic feet, as I recall. I found the idea sort of disturbing. I didn't bother to look at the bag, but I assume that the mulch is made from old tires. It is. It is very useful for mulching under children's play equipment, or in industrial areas. Tsu -- To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection. - Jules Henri Poincaré |
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