I’ve g mulched so much out there. that one section is just doomed I think, full sun, no water and difficult hose access.
@krismoriah the guy sharpening the nail splits the wood
I should clarify, my mowing is either an AWD articulating rider with a front mounted mulching deck, or for more extreme, a rotary cutter (brush hog) on the back of a little Kubota tractor.
I converted my fenced in raised bed garden, to plant in the ground. Updated the fence so I can peel off the ends and till the rows. Space the rows so the riding mower deck fits between them and around the perimeter. This means only needed to manually deal with Canadian thistle in the actual cultivated bed. Gates on either end are wide enough to drive the mower in.
The deck is 41" wide. And it can climb and descend our steep hills:
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i know… just saying that some folks are ‘extra’.
My job when i was about 5yrs old was to dull nails for my dad. Our farmhouse is red oak board and batten. I had a few pairs of dykes and had to clip the sharp ends off.
I read much later in life that some folks dip them in oil… not sure why we didnt do that… but i had the strongest hands in school by a mile.
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My neighbor was a groundskeeper at a golf course, so you can imagine how immaculate his yard is. He sits down on the grass and picks out every blade of grass that has made their way into flower beds. I’m not exaggerating on that either.
As for the yard, I see him fertilize, water, mow, bag, repeat Almost every day without fail. It looks beautiful but it never quite seemed right to me. It’s an endless circle.
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I am surprised he could afford a house as a groundskeeper. It depends on the person too. I am super organized at work but at home I through everything on the ground. The reason behind that is that I ran a Post Office that I did not organize and things got super out of hand. Now I get mad when someone uses a item and does not put it back exactly where it was.
potting stuff goes all in one place.
I’m lazy. I need a chair
mushroom pile and buckets go next to the rain barrels. which are by the roof edge that fills them. there’s a pawpaw or two back behind them where it’s often damp and very shaded except in early morning.
you need a hammock. it’s what trees are actually for.
That’s how I feel about vacuuming and making the bed.
OK, it took me a while to come back to this. What finally reminded me was spending several hours of mowing and weed whacking this afternoon (23K steps…). It is very much a work in progress, as I kept seeing more things I should be doing better.
Let me start with one which is a rental that I’ve been able to keep in reasonable shape without too much effort. The Belgian block bed (pre-existing when I bought it) on the far left is kind of high maintenance (or it would be if I tried to keep it weed-free). Otherwise, it isn’t bad.
Here’s one from my house where I violate the “no mulching big areas” rule. But, it is out front, so I’ve spent the effort to keep it up. And I did put a few layers of cardboard under the woodchips a year ago, which has so far helped, though it won’t last.
This one is also in front and shows the plastic edging. It does OK at reducing the amount of weed whacking, but there is still some. And worse, when you do need to WW, it can knock the little pins out which hold it down, leaving tiny holes for more grass to grow through. And the pins sometimes work their way up (maybe from winter frost heave?), so every once in a while I need to step back on them to force them down. As you can tell, I have mixed feelings about it. I don’t plan to buy any more, but am not ripping the existing ones out.
An the growing area itself has a ground-cover (pre-existing my purchase), periwinkle, I think. I added a bunch of chips near the edging and WW anything which comes up there. For the weeds that come up in the ground cover, I just run the weed whacker over it, but a bit higher than normal, leaving some periwinkle.
Here are a couple “beds” for mini-dwarf apples which are made out of cement blocks. These are annoying to maintain and I often ignore them.
Not only does it require WW on the outside perimeter of the bed, but it needs a ton of weeding inside the bed. And even worse, stuff grows up from the holes in the blocks. If you use the WW on that, it only cuts things to the opening in the block, leaving the base of the weeds to keep growing stronger.
I’m planning to remove both of these. I can grade the soil to slope gradually to the lawn and make it so I can mow the whole thing (WW around trees (hand weed for the last inch) and posts).
Here’s a pic of a bed that I removed last year. There also used to be a 3rd tree in the bed, which I transplanted out to make more space. You can just barely see a gentle hill that they are planted on, which I can mow without issue.
Here’s something that already existed when I bought one of the rentals last year. A long row of hostas along the fence. It turns out that they work pretty well at suppressing weeds due to their thick foliage. I can mow right along them and don’t need to weed whack at all.
On the other hand. it is pretty annoying if they don’t form a thick and continuous border. Near the end, they peter out a bit and the small gaps are a pain, since I can’t closely mow along the fence. Instead I need to WW by hand along the fence and the hostas. I may eventually just give up on the stand alone hostas and run them over with the mower. But, I’ll leave the long row, as it seems to be pretty low maintenance.
One thing to not do is to use old hollow core doors as mulch. It was appealing, as I had a bunch of old doors from a reno and though that I could use them to mulch a big area. Quick and easy, right? Well, they break down quickly and they leave a bunch of little pieces of wood. And weeds still grew up around them. As far as I’m concerned, the only ways to keep weeds down on a big area (short of asphalt or pouring cement) is to make sure I can easily mow it. And after the doors start to break down, the little pieces need to be removed before I can start mowing it…
Here’s an area I never have a good way to handle. It is a steep hill (maybe 8-10 vertical feet), with rocks strewn around it. The best I’ve been able to do is mulch with cardboard, covered with wood chips, then WW or pull by hand. Of course, mulching the hill makes it even harder to move around on it without slipping…
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I need more of that organization myself. My yard contains the foundation of an old post office. It seems that whoever was the postmaster, the postoffice was built in their yard. I live in a tiny village and my house was built 1885.
I have a she shed of sorts that I keep my yard supplies in. Every year I have to do a major enpty and reorganize as things tend to creep towards the door. I’m overdue on that. Right now my spraying supplies are near the door and the grafting stuff has worked it’s way further in.
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Bob,
We have used the Rain tree timer and emitters on our porch containers. So this will be the first year for in the ground.
Not sure how much the turf has effected the past tomato plants but we have not fertilized to much. This year I will be hitting them a bit more often.
With regards to my weeds along the fence, I decided to carefully spray weed killer. It is slow acting so I wait and see.
This thread has been amazing. I definitely need to focus on the “make it so you can mow”. I am still in the “setup” phase so I can benefit from all your advice!
I also don’t know anything about grass or mowing (from CA where we cultivate grass and it’s got to be coddled and watered and weeds just shrivel and die) but moved to VA (where grass and weeds just grow and if I look away they’re knee high).
Questions:
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I have driven my mower over small sticks and the edge of mulched areas - I was told I would just need to sharpen mower blades more often. Is this okay? Until I get things under control enough that I can avoid them?
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What are people doing with trimmed branches? I want to mulch them into wood chips where they are but also wary because of diseases. But also, not sure it really matters? Right now, the most I can do is trim and toss in a pile about 5’-10’ from my trees. Can I just chip them into woodchips and leave them near the fruit trees or should I drag off and put in burn pile (I am removing anything that is fireblight -like to a burn pile).
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Currently area around fruit trees is grass. I have some grass scissors and have slowly been mowing then trimming close and putting wood chips around. I know I should mulch out to tree drip ring, but I just don’t have enough wood chips yet. Does this sound okay?
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Leaf mulch??!? I don’t get it. even if I run them over with the mower a zillion times, or put them through the chipper they don’t really seem to turn into anything that would suppress weeds or grass.
I’m sure I’ll have more questions. Appreciate any advice or additional tips!
Oh also, wanted to add. I have ~10 acres and about 4 acres is cultivated but overgrown trees/grass/garden. So my scale is not HUGE but bigger than suburban.
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I like the look of mowing between trees but I’m getting close to mulching instead. As my trees get larger, there is less space between them. A couple have already gotten large enough that I can’t get a mower through the space. I use comfrey which is a great multipurpose plant under the trees. It does a good job keeping weeds at bay.
I still do a number of weed eat passes annually and it takes a lot of time through 50 or so trees. I confess to using Roundup once a season to lower my overall workload. In a few years I will be knocking on the 70 yo door and I need to make my life simpler not harder.
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You must have a big mower
There’s not that much space between trees, especially peach trees. Also some trees have t stakes on either side in an effort to get them more upright. It’s a standard zero turn mower.
In autumn, pile all of your leaves in an out-of-the-way place. If some or all of them are chopped, so much the better, as they’ll decay more quickly that way. If you’ve got grass clippings (sans herbicide), some late season comfrey, pine needles (slow to rot, but great mulch), etc., throw that stuff in the pile, too. ( I like to pick up sweetgum tree pods with a lawn bagger and put them into my fall leaf pile—they rot beautifully.) By the time the growing season rolls around, you’ll have a pile (a bit smaller than when it began) of sodden, slimy and worm-filled rotting leaves. Some of this material will even come up in sheets—especially the more intact leaves. This makes a great, weed-suppressing, moisture-retentive, soil-building mulch for trees, shrubs, vegetables, etc., and it won’t just blow away in the wind like dry leaves. I love to put it on my sweet potato ridges, but use it everywhere.
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I should have mentioned that in my main post- I’ve used herbicides, but I try to only use them in areas where I don’t want anything to grow (gravel driveway) or on particularly tough weeds (Japanese Knotweed, poison ivy, bindweed, etc).
Leaf mulch/mold is the black, soil-like stuff I pick up from the transfer station. My town collects leaves in the fall, composts them, then makes the results available for residents for free.
Here’s a closer look:
From all my talk about wanting everything to be mowable, you might think that I take good care of my lawns. Actually, I just mow them. Any water or fertilizer they get is just overshoot from the fruit trees. I expect lawns to take care of themselves and use the mower to just keep everything (grass, weeds, clover, whatever is growing) to a short height.
Mostly, though I guess you could always get unlucky. I’ve hit plenty of sticks and woodchips. When I first started mowing, I never realized I should sharpen the blade. I went years without doing so. I think, by the end, the mower was basically swinging a dull metal bar around…
The thing to really avoid is rocks. I’ve hit plenty of them as well, but they can do some damage, both to mower and anything they get thrown into. Hence why I now try to remove rocks from anywhere I may want to mow in the future.
This is what happens when you use rocks as edging around a planting. It gets overgrown, then when you are mowing you could accidentally run over the rocks.
I eventually weed-whacked enough to find the stones and removed them all. Then, I smoothed the grade with a hoe and started mowing this area. Much nicer now (I need to get an updated pic…).
Updated (current pic of that row):
I’d be interested to hear other’s opinions on this, but I only mulch out about a foot, with the leaf mold (refreshing it a few times each year, but it is easy when a 5 gal bucket can do 3 trees…). Mine is just to keep the stuff close to the trunk limited, so there isn’t much left after I mow. The black leaf mold also looks pretty nice- high contrast with the green grass.
When I first started, I assumed the same as you- that it would be better for the trees to mulch out further. But, I didn’t realize what a pain in the but it would be to keep it up, with a lot more weed-whacking and/or hand weeding. And when you don’t keep it clear, you just have a lot of weeds growing under the tree, which probably isn’t any better than grass. Maybe more mulch is needed if you have a tree that really can’t stand any competition, like mini-dwarf apples. Though even there, I think you could probably compensate by watering more.
I used to do that, then the pile started to get taller than my back fence. I got a chipper, but it is a pain to use, taking a long time, loud, jams up, limited sized branches, which often need trimming to fit, etc. Now, I generally just fill up my car and toss it at the dump (yard waste area, where I assume it is either burned or composted). It’s actually faster to bring it to the dump (<5 minutes away) than it is to handle it at home. If I want wood-chips, I can get a load dropped off for free from a tree cutter. Though since I’m using a lot less of them, I haven’t finished the last load which is probably close to 2 years old now.
I pruned a bunch of mulberry waterspouts which are long, straight, and not that thick. So, rather than bringing them to the dump, I decided to chip them. They’ve been sitting next to my driveway for almost 2 months, waiting for me to get the motivation to get the chipper out for them. There is always something more pressing/interesting to do. After all, better to plant the potatoes so they can get growing. Better to graft when the weather cooperates…even better to weed whack, so the weeds don’t go to seed. I should just give up on that idea and bring them to the dump with the next load 
It’s even more important for you to figure this out than me. I’ve got 1/2 acre total at home and only a couple acres at the rentals (in 0.1 to 0.3 acre pieces). 4 acres will quickly overwhelm you if you don’t keep a handle on it.
Here’s a couple other problem areas in my yard.
This is what happens when you have things too closely planted…This one pic has:
Peach
Nectarine,
Euro Plum
Blackberries
Grape
2+ types of sour cherries
a jujube (peeking in on right)
I really dilsike working on this area- I need to climb all over the big rocks, while watching my footing. Hence, you can see how overgrown it has become. To give you an idea of scale, the boulders are about 6’ tall.
Speaking of rocks, this is what happens eventually when using them as mulch.
Anyone have good ideas of what to do with all these rocks? I’ll probably either remove them at some point or give in and spray them with herbicide. Though I’m a bit hesitant to do that with the plum trees growing under them.
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I try to model my planting around tractor implement widths. And have a tractor
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@Rosdonald Your orchard is sooo beautiful! How did you get the squares? (Also, dang we are lucky! We live in such a beautiful place! I drove down towards your neck of the woods yesterday to help a friend level a trailer. The whole drive all I could think was how pretty it was.)
Are you thinking about mulching in between the trees but not the rows? That is what I am thinking. I saw @olpea’s orchard pictures (I know it’s much much bigger than our scale) and that’s how it looked.
@BobVance - thanks! That leaf mould looks very nice. I can imagine it makes a pretty contrast. Here I’ve seen lots of dyed woodchips. I also saw a product at the local hardware store that you can use to re-dye your woodchips.
I’ve at least avoided this! I know I am supposed to sharpen them and I’ve done so.
My understanding is that peach trees really hate weeds or grass or anything around their base but apples and pears aren’t so picky and will tolerate a bit. I’ll let the other experts make a verdict on this. I’d also like to hear about how other fruits feel about weeds or grass around their base. I have some persimmons and mulberries (also, pawpaw, but those seem to have some natural weed suppression or something…
It’s like you know me!
I did think it might be easier to just chip mine in place though. Hauling them around - even to the dump or burn pile is still pretty annoying - though possibly less annoying than the chipper.
WOW! that’s quite a fruit/boulder/weed-splosion. The boulders are really really, pretty. They seem to be holding up your soil there - otherwise, I’d encourage you to sell them to rich people as landscaping rocks! Maybe you could build a set of stairs to go up them and put a path in between the trees.
The little rocks just seem like a pain in the neck. Can you add to that retaining wall and dump dirt/woodchips/leafmould on it?
@droppingfruit I’m dreaming of my future tractor!! I actually got as far as the financing and everything. However, the dealer near me was so unresponsive when I was trying to 
buy the tractor, I was terrified that if something went wrong or I needed service, I’d have this terrible dealer and so I walked away. I’m looking at used now- I’m pretty good mechanically, but I was hoping for financing so I could get some fun attachments. I am also wondering if it isn’t better just to put that money towards a nice trailer and rent equipment… (I’m also taking tractor advice).
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One more thing! I’d also appreciate opinions on what I can do to make maintenance for a patio/path easy. Especially where the patio meets the grass edge and where it gets close to two trees I’d like to keep.
I drew a diagram. Currently the whole area is grass or grass-ish (the path sort of exists). I’d like a patio area between these two trees. The patio will be either concrete/concrete pavers/stone pavers.
How do you deal with the edge where the grass meets the patio edge? If the ground is high enough can I just mow with one wheel on the patio? I can’t see why not… but maybe I’m missing something - so I’m going to check with you all first!
Currently, the concrete circles that make the path are sunk in enough I just mow over them.
For the part where the trees get close to the patio, I’m thinking of a small wall, then I mulch/place woodchips around the tree thus making a space with no mowing.
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That’s exactly what I’m thinking. On another note I went to a planning commission meeting tonight about someone who wanted to rezone from residential to business. That decision aside, we have a community association although not officially an HOA. There is a lot of pressure to keep things looking tidy in my neck of the woods. They like my neat tidy mowing.
Sometimes that gets overwhelming and I want to naturalize a bit. I hate that people have that kind of influence but at the same time I’m holding back until I find a good method that’s doable for me. I’ll check into some members photos and ideas.
And yes to living in a beautiful part of the country. I do love it.
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