SBG (Straw Bale Gardening) with cardboad bales?

I was wanting to try my hand at some straw bale gardening on some rocky ground.  Looking in the local classifieds, bales are going for approximately $10 apiece.

I was about to shrug and go for it... Then (since I had "bales" in the search terms) I saw an posting for a local company giving away bales of used cardboard for free.

Almost clicked past that result as a false positive, but then I went, "Say, now..."
1) right size and shape  
2) the structure is more or less similar
3) worms do seem to love the taste of composting cardboard

What do you think?  Is this idea too nuts, or does it have potential?

Hm! That's a novel idea.

With straw bales, the stalks are all neatly lined up. When you flip them on their side, they are all vertical and it's easy for plant roots to penetrate.

These cardboard bales seem to be compressed together willy-nilly. I wonder if roots could drill down into them.

Personally, I also wonder about all the goo in the labels and packing tape. Fine for flowers, but I'm not sure about garden vegetables.

And yet, free stuff always catches my attention...

Hi K,

If you go with this ..Even as an experiment…keep us updated.   I suspect that saturating the bales with water will help with the root issue.

On second thought, use lots of manure tea.

John F Dean wrote:On second thought, use lots of manure tea.

Yes, I was thinking the same thing. That's what straw bale gardening requires in the first year -- regularly saturating with some kind of fertilizer.

When I look at that cardboard bale, I want to cut it vertically with a sawzall that has a long blade. Then push in soil and compost, and water with compost tea. Plants might have a chance after that.

Even if it doesn't work as a replacement for a strawbale, I can think of a dozen uses for that much cardboard, just on its own.

But if you try it as a straw bale, make sure you document it here!

I read somewhere that worms particularly like the glue in most corrugated carboard, and the bale in the picture appears to be mostly that.

If you need soil, I'd be very tempting. There is some valid concern about contaminants in cardboard, so I might be tempted the first year to treat it just as "soil building" and plant things that are known to sequester toxins - for example sunflowers absorb lead.

I do think a key thing is getting it thoroughly wet and then not letting it dry out too much. Mixtures of fertilizer pee and compost/weed teas may be useful too.

In my climate, if I could get a lot of them cheap, I could imagine making a surround with them and filling the center with leaves in the fall. They'd contain the leaves which would turn into leaf mold, and we're wet enough in the winter that by spring the bales would be plenty wet enough to  plant into. Again, even if all I planted was flowers, mushrooms, or things I could chop and drop to build soil, I would feel like I was making progress over my rocky clay soil which looks more like subsoil (glacial till) than useful soil.

Are they bound with the plastic (PETG) straps?
Maybe use a large hole saw to make planting cavities that you can fill with soil/compost and a plant?
So awesome!

I wouldn't mind having a few to experiment with and continue in my wood chipping adventure. I think you could find a way with several over time. But, and it's a big but, the problem is not using it for a certain purpose in a particular location. It's getting it there and being able to "handle it". They are HEAVY, you'll need a forklift or 10 men to get it in your truck. If you don't have the same at the homestead...good luck. If you break it apart you could re-bundle with a binder tool and strapage and even make several smaller ones. Question is, do you want to do all that? Call and ask the place giving it away how much it weighs, you'll be surprised.

Another issue you will find is the compression of keeping it strapped and then adding moisture or trying to form a hole in something that is compressed, before and after moisture then repeated exposure to the elements etc........weird things can happen.

One last thing... Where there is Will & Wit, there's a way. I'm willing if you are =) If nothing else we learn... more Will =more Wit =P

I had an idea about this while I was at work today.

But before that,  the new replies:

Yaknow, he does make a point there. I went back to the opening post and looked at the image a bit closer. It might have the proportions of a straw bale but that cardboard bail is definitely bigger, you can tell by the Machinery around it.  Moving it will take equipment or a team of weightlifters.

If the 'seller' can forklift them into a pickup truck or trailer. You might be able to tow/drag them out onto the ground at home. If you have the equipment at home to handle them, you're golden.


On the other hand, while I was at work I was thinking about the (drill holes and plant things in the cardboard) idea.
The cardboard is primarily carbon in compost terms.

So plant the bale with clover.  (Nitrogen!)  
When you have little ones visiting, one of the games to play could be looking for four-leaf clovers.

Alternately, populate with other nitrogen fixing plants.

If you can deposit the bale in something like a tarp or a kiddy pool or a stock tank that will keep the water in. This will keep the water around the bail to help keep it saturated maybe you won't need to constantly water it. Maybe a couple of good doses of compost/worm tea in the beginning to help establish biology and let-er-rip. Then let the plants make your compost.

Will this grow mycelium?

Nancy Graven wrote:
Maybe use a large hole saw to make planting cavities that you can fill with soil/compost and a plant?

That was my thought exactly.  I might also try (very carefully) cutting slots into one of the bales with my chainsaw and filling the slots with compost.  You could get more compost into the bale that way and give the plants a little more growing room before they hit cardboard.

K Eilander wrote:I was wanting to try my hand ....What do you think?  Is this idea too nuts, or does it have potential?

Any updates? If you call this location and ask, "how heavy are they?" If they don't know ask for the model# of the baler. They are specifically made for baling cardboard and with the model# you can find the size and weight of a typical bale.

I used to run the warehouse at a big retail place and the cardboard bales always seemed scary to me. I hated moving them around with the forklift. The cardboard gets compressed sooo tight, and then bound with wire. I always imagined that wire snapping and whipping out and taking my ear off or something. They're probably totally fine. I'm sure they get dropped off forklifts and smashed around in all kinds of ways and you don't hear about baling wire injuries. I don't, anyway. Still, if you're soaking the thing in water and the cardboard is expanding and the wire is getting rusty..

If I wasn't scared of them, I'd totally try it, though.  

I think the cardboard bales are going to be a lot denser than a straw bale, so not sure how the plants will handle that. Planting cavities might actually be necessary.