William Mulcher

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since Aug 01, 2018
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NW Arkansas Ozarks
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Recent posts by William Mulcher

I really love this conversation, and all these ideas!  Leigh's experience, and edge pictures are very consistent with my experience.

Ben's edge control sketch may work, depending on how deep the roots go in your area, and how wide the sawdust filled trench is.  It looks to be about 2', which I would say is the minimum.  It would certainly be wonderfully easy to pull the grass roots out of the sawdust, but only if you know they are there.  If the roots go deep in your area, they might sneak through the sawdust undetected, and emerge within your beds.  My trenches are currently empty, so as the roots emerge from the lawn, they become visible, and I can pull them.  This however does require regular digging out, because gravity, and cannot really be used as a walkway.

As far as the competing plants on the border, the one thing that I have observed that naturally and consistently beats bermuda grass is deep shade.  I have a row of mature bradford pears (I know, I know) which cast deep shade and have virtually no grass (of any kind) under them.  I would suggest that the competing plants be dense, bushy plants at least 2' tall.

Perhaps this is part of the reason that comfrey has been said to work well.  If you do use comfrey in this way, I would be hesitant to chop it, as many people do.  Also, if it dies back in the winter, it would need to bush out again before it got hot and the bermuda grass came out of its dormancy.  I'm not familiar enough with comfrey to know.

I would guess that something like a dwarf holly may also work well.
4 years ago
I have had *some* success with this, though it took me a couple of years.  There are a few things that I have learned that might be helpful.

Bermuda grass is impossible to pull from compacted or hard/dry soil.  It just breaks off at the ground level.  It is much easier to pull from wood chip mulch, and even easier from compost.  From the mulches, you can "easily" remove incredibly long ropes of root/rhizome.

In my soil at least (described below), the bermuda grass roots prefer to grow into the mulch than into the soil.  After a year mulched with wood chips, most of the roots migrated into the chips.  There may still be some down in the soil, but they seem to be small and weak.

I recommend against planting perennials your first year, since pulling the bermuda grass roots may disturb them.  If you have to dig the grass out of your beds the second season, you don't want your perennials to be in the way.

Once I established a bermuda grass-free zone, I seem to be able to control the edges with a shallow ditch, with mulch on both sides.  I consider the deep mulched area on the grass side of the ditch to be my future growing area.  Whenever I see rhizomes or roots try to cross the ditch, I can pull them back pretty relatively easily because of the deep mulch on the grass-side.


Basically, my process going forward will be to deep mulch an adjacent area and let the grass grow into it, using the ditch to keep it out of my garden.  Then, after a year, I can expand the garden area by either removing the remaining mulch (riddled with grass roots), or pulling all of the roots out of it, and moving the ditch out 4 feet.  Then mulch another 4 feet beyond that.

I have fairly compacted soil, and a shallow water table.  Humid subtropical, with a fair amount of rain.  I've not done any soil testing, so I don't know how the composition, but I suspect it is mostly clay.  It does not drain well.  I mention this because it might affect how deep the bermuda grass roots go.

4 years ago
Maybe I'm crazy, but this doesn't look like a south-facing wall.  If you are wanting to plant in the area you are solarizing, then it looks like an east-facing wall.  I believe south-facing walls as far north as Quebec should get sun all day, unless blocked by something else, like trees or another structure.

I would also consider hardy berries.  They could probably handle the poor soil, and also the runoff from the roof (which looks pretty high, so might hurt more delicate plants).
Very nice!  As a newbie, I don't have much in the way of suggestions for you, just shared concern.  Given all the rain we have had in the Ozarks this winter/spring, we have had a fair amount of standing water as well in the last week.  

I heavily mulched my garden area with around 6" wood chips last fall/winter.  Given that it is elevated, it doesn't have standing water, and is definitely nicer to walk on.  However, when all of the surrounding soil is waterlogged, I expect that the soil under the wood chips is probably also waterlogged.  This was supported by my experience when I dug the mulch aside to build a bed, revealing saturated heavy clay.

I'm not sure how much of a problem this will be though.  I'm trying to look at it as an advantage, particularly if the mulch preserves the moisture in the soil for longer.
6 years ago
In addition to the things that have already been mentioned, I have a couple of other possible culprits.

If you didn't remove the blossom end of the cucumbers, they can end up soft.  I remove both ends to be safe.

If you cooked the pickles (used a hot brine, or canned them), they could get soft.

Sometimes cucumbers that are too old get bitter.  This could have impacted the taste.

Good luck on your next attempt!
7 years ago
I actually have a batch of kosher dills going right now as well, about a week and a half in.  Tasting it a few days ago, mine was also a bit salty and half-sour.  It has been my experience that the saltiness does diminish as the sourness grows, or at least isn't as noticeable.  However, I would accept that it might be a little saltier than store-bought pickles.  I would definitely suggest keeping it going for another week or two.

Unless it was much too salty, I would not dilute it as Ed suggested.  It has been my experience that when doing that (with sauerkraut), it promoted scum and mold on the top.  That isn't a real problem, since you can safely skim it off, but it is a pain, and a little gross.

When making sauerkraut, I even got in the habit of pouring a glug or two or vinegar in after the brine gets going.  I found it made the surface need much less skimming.  I didn't do that for these cucumber pickles, and they need skimming every couple of days (white film, little spots of mold on top, nothing abnormal).  If you do dilute it as Ed suggested, I would add some vinegar as well, not too much, but some.

Good luck!
7 years ago
I had this trouble as well, when looking for organic straw.  Ultimately, I gave up.  I learned a couple of things that might be helpful.  

Ignoring roundup, which may or may not degrade quickly, you also have to be concerned about persistent broadleaf herbicides [1].  Farmers sometimes spray this to kill non-grasses in their fields or pastures.  These poisons are designed to persist in the soil, often lasting for years in concentrations that can be harmful to garden plants (beans are particularly sensitive).  Even worse, these herbicides pass through the guts of livestock mostly intact, making compost created with their manure also harmful.  Since these are sprayed on pastures, they can show up in non-organic HAY as well as straw and manure.

I don't know how well the fungal techniques mentioned will break down these chemicals.

You didn't say what you needed the straw for, but my conclusion was that wood chips were the safest form of mulch from a herbicide/pesticide perspective at least.  However they do take a long time to turn into soil if you are trying to build it up.

[1] https://compostingcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/USCC-PH-Fact-Sheet-1-for-web.pdf
7 years ago