CHARLOTTE – “CAN YOU HAVE TOO MUCH MULCH?”

Don’t get us wrong because we deal in mulch and other landscape supplies, but you can have too much mulch. At some point in time when your flower and plant beds accumulate 6, 7, 8 inches or more of mulch depth, it’s time to literally pull out and remove the old mulch and replace it with no more than 3 to 4 inches of the fresh mulch of your choosing. Too much mulch can be detrimental to your beloved plants, trees, and shrubs. Too much mulch can become compacted, restrict the benefits of nutritional soil amendments that decaying mulch provides and prevent much-needed moisture from reaching the delicate root systems of your precious plants. Mulch does decay over a period of time but mulch applied too often that builds up beyond 3 ” to 4″ hardens and does not allow mulch to breathe preventing the much-needed decay process and can actually damage your plants.

If you’re planning to remove your mulch build-up, January and February are excellent times to prepare for your Spring plantings.