Getting Free Woodchips

The same place I get free compost from also has free wood chips. I have been hauling them home by the bucket load several times a week. The buckets work great because they are easy to haul around the yard to where they need to be. Filling them is also very easy. I typically walk up the pile and use the fork to just push the chips into the bucket. Each one takes about 10 seconds to fill. Much faster than scooping into a trailer.

I have two uses planned for the wood chips. The first is to replace the paths in my garden. I put some new cardboard down and then the wood chips on top. The cardboard should prevent weeds from growing up under the wood chips for a while. It is starting to look nice in the backyard.

The second use is mulch. I re-mulched most of my flower beds, fruit trees, and bushes. I will also mulch the raised beds in the photo above once the plants are in and a bit more mature. The mulch really cuts down on the amount of water I need to use to keep my plants alive since the wood acts as little sponges. They also do a great job suppressing weeds. A little work now hopefully means I will have less to do later.

I am also thinking of experimenting with composting the wood chips with used coffee grounds to make my own hot compost pile.

Do you use wood chips in your garden?

Composting with Wood Chips

I have two decent sized compost bins in the backyard. I also have a wormbin in the house. The worms aren’t eating enough of the food waste yet, so I continue to store compost in buckets in the garage. Once they are all full, I haul the buckets to the big bins in the backyard. Not much is happening since it is so cold outside. Only one of the piles is slowly shrinking.

I usually put some shredded paper or leaves on the bottom of the buckets to soak up the juice and to provide a bit better balance of browns/greens in the mix. I watched a YouTube video last week about using woodchips in compost. It seemed like a great idea since I’m out of leaves. I made a trip to the county woodchip pile. I picked up a couple buckets for free.

My plan is to use them on the bottom of the buckets as a liner. I think they will work better than the leaves or paper which had a tendency to mat down and stick to the bucket once they got wet. I’ll throw some in the middle and on top as well to help control bugs and smell. I use the compost in my gardens for both the annual vegetables and the perennials.