Wood Chip Surprises- Share yours!

A lot of us have had free/cheap wood chip mulch deliveries dropped off from tree trimming companies. I think we all know that it’s rolling the dice to do so, and we have all found certain “surprises.” So I wanted to start a fun and informative thread here by asking the question: What are the most fun (or not fun) things you have received in a woodchip drop?

My first drop brought a ton of cup-fungus to the property. No big deal
My second drop... a ton of ditch-weed seeds sprouting up all over now! Along with hog-peanut and wild yam.
If I get a load of honey locust thorns, I'll reject it and send them packing even if it burns a bridge with that company.

Matt, those are lovely surprises to have.

Here are some links for others that may not know what these are:

Mushroom are great workers to have:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pezizaceae

Dennis said, "I think what's most crucial is to keep the moisture level adequate to allow for bacterial and fungal colonisation.

https://permies.com/t/114024/Covered-yard-chips#931740

And free peanuts:

https://permies.com/t/166262/Sugar-maple-guild#1306322

Honey locust:

https://permies.com/t/1664/edibility-honey-locust-leaves-pods

Anne Miller wrote:
Honey locust:
https://permies.com/t/1664/edibility-honey-locust-leaves-pods

Pods, good idea! Because they might be more visible than the thorns in a truck... and flag a REJECTION.
We got a load of free mulch when I was a kid and it was absolutely full of honey locust and the thorns would puncture right through your shoes. Not something I want anywhere near my food forest. I've been stabbed enough by them in this lifetime

I got quite a nice stainless steel leaf rake in my delivery. They never came back for it.....

Ground Ivy, aka Creeping Charlie.  Really sucks…

The batch of wood chips that I PAID FOR last year has sprouted tons of baby maple trees.  Relatively easy to handle, but annoying nonetheless.

Laurel Jones wrote:The batch of wood chips that I PAID FOR last year has sprouted tons of baby maple trees.  Relatively easy to handle, but annoying nonetheless.

Stick them in pots and sell them for a couple of dollars!

I've only ever been fortunate enough to get one load of wood chips even though I keep getting on various waiting lists.

That load of woodchips sprouted all sorts of interesting funguses and got me really interested in identifying them all. It was really cool.

So many different types of fungi.   I get mushrooms of many shapes and sizes and colors all the time.   I should have been photographing and IDing them all along, but only so many hours in a day.   Some of them might be really cool.   No bad surprises so far.

I found one of their work signs complete with a very heavy tripod to hold it. I discarded the sign; the tripod is in my "who knows, might need it sometime" collection. The most fun things I've found were not actually delivered with the chips but got there a different way.  Baby snapping turtles about the size of a US quarter, very cute little critters.

Hi,  I was supposed to get a load of pine chips.  I also got a load of horse tail in the mix.  It's an impossible toxic weed for grazing animals to get rid of.

I signed up for a free drop off, but they weren't active much in my area. It was 6 years before I received my first load. Then a second load was dropped off a week after the first one, so just getting wood chips was a huge surprise. A few pecans have sprouted in the piles.

Our regular chip drop team have a truck contaminated with dog vomit slime mould. Harmless, but every single pile they bring us grows a slime mould after a few months. Hasn't seemed to impact the usefulness of the chips in anyway way, and my wine caps seem able to outcompete it in the log term.

For all the people talking about stuff growing  in their chips - our chips usually rest for 6 months in a heap before being used. They get pretty hot in the first few weeks and cook off a lot of seeds.

I contacted a local tree trimming service to get whatever mulch they were willing to drop off for free. I got a huge load of mixed pine & mystery wood.
The biggest surprise was the largest slugs I've ever seen - apparently a member of the largest slug species in the world.
Also ass-clenchingly massive spiders.
Surprise!

I haven't minded the spiders, after the initial shock and horror of one leaping off my shovel. I've had very little pest problems. The plant-eating insects seem to be sticking to the weeds rather than my garden.

Overall I'm very happy with my woodchips. Once I finish off this pile, I think getting a new load every spring would be an excellent plan. Maybe I'll wait for the leaves to come in this time, so it decomposes a little faster.