Last year, I planted lots of perennial plants/flowers, trees, and bushes. we mulched around all of them. This year I have bought lots and lots of seeds (I’m a little dangerous around flowers) because I love the idea of self sowing annuals also. To save money I went with seeds. I have in the past loved growing zinnias and many other wild flowers from seed so I expect to have good success with all of mine. I have many different kinds that I want to plant in various beds. I’m hoping that over planting will help keep weeds out and the need for mulch will be minimal after this year.
But saying that, should I just scrape all the mulch away that we put on last year? It would be quite a bit of work but I want to do it correctly. I have read that some people just open up a little areas between the mulch and plant seed but I think that might actually be more work. Of course it would be nice to keep some mulch on the ground to help with temperature and moisture and weed suppression while my seeds grow, but my main concern with leaving some mulch down is that at the end of the growing season, the self seeding varieties will fall on mulch and then they won’t seed anyway.
My gut feeling is that perhaps I should just clear all the mulch off where I will be seeding. Perhaps I can mulch lightly around the perimeter of the beds to discourage outside seeds blowing in. i’m hoping
there will be some foliage left in the beds that I can leave up through the winter to perform as “mulch”, but I’m not sure. Any thoughts? Have you had success with overplanting and not mulching?
But saying that, should I just scrape all the mulch away that we put on last year? It would be quite a bit of work but I want to do it correctly. I have read that some people just open up a little areas between the mulch and plant seed but I think that might actually be more work. Of course it would be nice to keep some mulch on the ground to help with temperature and moisture and weed suppression while my seeds grow, but my main concern with leaving some mulch down is that at the end of the growing season, the self seeding varieties will fall on mulch and then they won’t seed anyway.
My gut feeling is that perhaps I should just clear all the mulch off where I will be seeding. Perhaps I can mulch lightly around the perimeter of the beds to discourage outside seeds blowing in. i’m hoping
there will be some foliage left in the beds that I can leave up through the winter to perform as “mulch”, but I’m not sure. Any thoughts? Have you had success with overplanting and not mulching?