green mulch
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Recycling Annual Plants
Many of the plants currently in the garden are annuals, so after a season of growing, they disperse their seeds and die. This is an intentional part of my strategy, so that I can have a seasonal wildflower meadow in the front yard, and plenty of wildlife-friendly plants in the back yard to fill in Continue reading
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Shredding A Few Excess Plants
I am limited in what I can compost here because I only have space for a small tumbling composter. That takes care of all of our household kitchen scraps and some of the garden waste. Tumbling composters don’t get hot enough to kill weed seeds, so there are some times when I will discard plant Continue reading
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Clearing This Year’s Bumper Crop Of Sunflowers
In this first full year on the property, I let annual plants take the lead as I considered what more long-term plans could be for the garden. Annual plants fill space to capture water and reduce soil erosion, and encourage wildlife visitors (birds and insects). When they are finished and cut down, their decaying roots Continue reading
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Big Clean Up In The Back Yard
This year I filled almost all unused space in the back yard with annual wildflowers, some seeded by me and some volunteers. This “green mulch” approach is intended to capture water, improve soil health, and support wildlife visitors. Since these plants are not permanent fixtures, I am free to remove any of them to make Continue reading
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A Gift For The Garden (And My Hands)
The “green mulch” approach of growing annual plants to fill my space this year means that I am generating quite a bit of biomass when it comes time to cut those plants down. In the short term, I have been able to lay cut stems on the ground as pathways but I will eventually run Continue reading
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Clearing A Back Corner
In this second year of my “rewilding” project, I am using annual native flowers (seeded or volunteer) to cover most of the back yard. This “green mulch” approach allows me to capture water before it runs off, prevent soil erosion, improve soil health, and host wildlife visitors while I continue to make more long-term plans Continue reading
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Too Much Of A Good Thing
The Firewheel aka Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella) that I seeded last fall have grown so well that in some cases they’re crowding out other things. One of those was my valiant little Texas Mountain Laurel tree (photo above). I cut back some of the surrounding plants to give the tree more space, and to give me better access Continue reading
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Improvising A New Pathway
In this second year of creating a nature garden, I’ve written before about using annual plants to fill unplanned space with native wildflowers as “green mulch”. These plants protect the ground from erosion, help to capture rain water, aerate the soil with their roots, introduce much-needed organic matter that will eventually decay, and are food Continue reading
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“Green Mulch”
In my desire to create a little nature reserve in my urban lot, I could have spent a lot of money to get everything designed and installed in the first year. However, I prefer to take the longer strategy of doing things in stages, learning as I go. I think that when I look back Continue reading
About Me
Nature Lover.
Inquisitive Observer.
Student Gardener.
I invite you to join me on my journey to convert my sterile (from a nature point of view) new house lot to a healthy and diverse ecosystem, as I make discoveries, mistakes, and hopefully progress. I am not an expert or professional. The project started in February 2023 and the location is Seguin, Texas, USA.
Rewilding My Lot 