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This is just the beginning in terms of exploring this fascinating but often misunderstood resource on this channel. In this video I mention how woodchip can be a way to make huge amounts of compost in the medium-term, a kind of woodchip that is very exciting for annual production potential, and also an interesting benefit of using woodchip as a path material. I hope you enjoy and don’t forget to enter our contest, info a little further down 🙂
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30 Comments
Thanks 🙏 ❤
You mentioned the dirty word, 'carbon'. According to our gardening experts 'the politicians' we're killing the planet with our gardening habits🤡
Nice
❤
I get all excited about your newest videos❤😊
Interesting Huw, I have never heard of RCW in any format…Steve…🙂
Really appreciate this video, Huw. Just had a delivery of wood chip to my house and now it's time to get to work with it!
I love your films and there pack with information
Hi Richard thanks for sharing intersting video. I want to know the composition of wood chips and other materials in your compost. I am waiting for your reply. Thanks in advance. 👍👍🙏🙏
You always have a nice presentation. Thank you!
I've access to pretty much unlimited wood chip at the allotment and have decided to adapt James Prigioni's style of gardening. I've put down maybe a 6" layer on my entire allotment bar the no dig beds themselves. Absolutely delighted with the amount and variety of mushrooms popping up and the mycelia just beneath the surface this year. I can see the roots of my crops extending right into the fresh chippings too plus the amount of water they're holding I think it's a game changer for me. It's breaking up my clay soil too I presume. Looking forward to digging down next year to see. Throw in the fact its controlling weeds and I really can't recommend it enough. Doesn't seem to be harbouring slugs though I'm being sure to apply it all before winter so it has time to be well compacted by spring as I think last year it maybe harboured a few as it was freshly applied and had plenty of damp air gaps for them to hide in. Going up tomorrow to fill and apply another 2-3 half tonne bags of chips to the last uncovered area.
what do you know about bark? The tree "skin" not the animal sound.Can you compost it?
Use it as a mulch?
Is there a manual alternative to the wood chipper? I currently use a lawn mower, which works but leaves a mess. I was hoping for something quiet and peaceful!
Woodchips reduces the PH and makes the soil far too acidic as it breaks down for most of the annuals when mixed in with the soil.
My lovely wood chips were delivered and I utilized them in many areas.4 years later I’m still battling earwigs infestation.
i think i'm finally starting to understand the composting ratios. it made sense.
as far as the chippers go, I'm scared of them… guess I watched to many horror movies from childhood. yet I do mow the lawn. XD
Woodchip + manure + kitchen waste + cut lawn + dead leaves + big 'potatoes' of earth + a bit of forest soil picked nearby + water + pee = 👍
I chip all of my hedge clippings and they go on my veg beds as a mulch throughout the summer along with all of my grass clippings, never composted either of them.
Weeds/veg peelings/wood shavings from the chickens etc are semi composted and added at the end of the season.
You can also be intentional about what mushrooms to plant. companion planting is interesting, but i think a cool next step in that would be to incorporate edible mushrooms too. Like Stropharia rugosoannulata
I'm across the pond in Canada, and have been using a very thick layer of wood chips on my gardens. Works amazingly well for retaining water, considering my garden is essentially on a sand bank (there's very little clay in the soil). The other things I've noticed are the worms and life underneath are very healthy.
I've just recently expanded my garden by 2,000sq/ft and dropped about a meter of the mulch on it that's been sitting for 3 years in the back forty. The breakdown of the chips already is amazing!
I never knew there was a name associated with chipped branches. Every fall when I prune the fruit trees I run all of the branches through the chipper and use them to mulch the very trees the pruned branches came from. Now I know those trees are mulched with RCW. 🙂
There is one issue with woodchips as a pathway material for me. That is that it get's stuck in my grass scissors when i'm cutting long grass along the edges that my lawn mower can't reach. and also it makes it really hard to deal with weeds and grass growing through the wood chips
We just had a major hurricane move thru so an abundance of ramial wood to make into chips. Thinking I will rent a chipper for the weekend and get to cleaning up! Might even offer to take branches from the neighbors if they want to deliver.
Very good video Huw. In the SE US where I am we have a product for potting soil/soil bed, sometimes called 'Pine Fines' or Pine bark soil conditioner. Basically it is pine bark ground up into very small particles, and composted for a period of time. It even has some fine dust particles. It's use is as a component in potting mixes, and will also improve the soil without robbing the soil of nitrogen, but not as a mulch. In the west of the US they grind up fir bark and use it basically in the same way. Bark, I believe takes even longer to break down than does wood chips if used as mulch. Trees are great!!! Not just for what they supply while they are alive but also afterward as well… and they even regenerate(sorry Doctor Who), along the root system… unbelievable.
My own experiments with new woodchips have proved as excellent asparagus bed mulch. No weeds. Clean spears. Also a permanent potato bed. Never had blight. Fruit cage. Never fertilised or watered, or needed to weed. However, during late summer, fall and most of winter I put the chickens in to dig up berry mite grubs. By the end of winter the chickens have fertilised and cleared the cage and most woodchips turned to soil. I simply remove chickens and recover with another 4-6” layer of woodchips for the growing season.
I have mixture of grass and woodchip paths.
I only mulch annual beds with semi-composted chips after transplanting starts/seedlings if I’m short on other mulch. Although it’s a pain for follow-on annual transplants for me. It’s difficult to scrape away larger woody material before transplanting/sowing. The chips fall into the transplant holes exactly where the roots are.
This year was particularly difficult due to lack of grass (drought) clippings so had to mulch more than I’d prefer with 2 year old wood chipping compost. Chicken coop provides exceptional quality compost on woodchips. They get fresh bucket loads every week from the pile that are jam packed with centipedes and wood lice. Loads of worms work their way up from below so the chips are well scratched about. Best to have a foot high skirt around the coop run to keep the chips inside!
How is inflation impacting your garden? Energy crisis affecting you I’m sure too.
Huw, another great video on a topic that we all need to continue learning about. I watch a lot of no-dig gardening videos as well as regenerative farming videos and it's encouraging to see/hear the same message being said and demonstrated for each practice (gardening and farming). Nature was made to create balance and with the ability to 'heal' itself. I read comments below about the concern of loss of nitrogen when applying wood chips; which you addressed in your video, because of what we once heard someone say. I would just encourage people to not only learn by what you hear but learn by what you actually see happening by trying different methods to your garden or farm. Thank you for sharing insights from your trial gardens and for allowing us to learn alongside you. As I have said before, I feel like I get a Master Gardener's lesson from 'Professor Richards' each time I watch a video. Kudos to you, Huw for what you are learning and teaching!
Inoculate your woodchips with LAB and they will brake down much faster
Thank you so much for this. We are building our homestead now and have been chipping tons to help tidy the forest paths and clean up deadfall from the edges of fields and I’ve seen so much contradictory information! I will continue chipping to my hearts content!
Who knew wood chip could be so interesting? Thank you so much for this!