![]() Straw can be a convenient type of mulch, and it’s often used around things like strawberries to keep the fruits from rotting on the soil. If you don’t have lots of deciduous trees, you’ll have difficulty getting enough leaves to mulch anything. You can’t exactly buy more leaves to add to your mulch, although you could volunteer to rake all your neighbor’s yards to collect their leaves. ![]() If you mow over them to chop them up, it takes way more leaves to create a decent mulch layer. The disadvantage of leaves as mulch is that if you leave them as whole leaves, they blow around a lot, and once they stop blowing around, they can start to look messy, slimy, and dirty. The main disadvantage of inorganic mulches is the upfront cost: all inorganic mulch types are generally more expensive than organic mulches, but they also don’t have to be top-dressed every 2-3 years. There is the risk of rubber releasing chemical compounds into the soil, it also doesn’t break down over time, and it doesn’t improve soil, and it’s also one of the most flammable options. Rubber mulch, while produced from recycled materials, doesn’t have much long-term study done on it. High-quality landscape fabric is expensive. ![]() Cheap landscape fabric tears easily, breaks down quickly, and only suppresses weeds for a year or two, and then it’s difficult to remove. High-quality landscape fabric keeps weeds down, but the roots of shrubs and trees will grow through it eventually, making it extremely difficult to remove in the future. Plastic sheeting also does not allow water, air, or nutrients to get down to the soil. Plastic sheeting can suffocate the soil, killing not just weeds but also other plants and all the soil’s microorganisms, effectively killing the soil. It’s also quite heavy and quite physically demanding to apply. If a rock mulch layer isn’t thick enough, the weeds will grow right through in no time and can be more challenging to remove. Rocks also do not add any nutrients to the soil over time. Rock mulch can absorb and reflect heat from the sun, making an area very hot and dry, so not many plants can survive in the area. Here are some of the disadvantages of inorganic mulches. Disadvantages are more specific to certain types of mulch. ![]()
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