I can only speak from personal experience. A few years ago I had a major purge of overgrown shrubs and trees, and shredded all the cuttings. I then spread them directly onto the borders with no obvious ill effect.
The only thing I'm slightly wary of now is the issue of honey fungus.
I've (fairly) recently realised I have HF in my garden. I would never use the infected section of a tree or shrub (usually the base of the trunk and / or roots) to make garden mulch. I would, however, shred and use the branches and upper parts of an infected tree as the fungus is unlikely to have reached those parts.
As for laying bark chippings: - some research by the RHS has indicated that a thick layer of uninfected bark chippings spread close to a source of HF can become infected and then act as an additional pathway for HF to spread around a border. That said - I still use bark nuggets around the garden - just not near very vulnerable plants such as viburnums.
Heaven is ... sitting in the garden with a G&T and a cat while watching the sun go down
I used shredded branches direct as a mulch on my borders last autumn and it just went mouldy? Pretty sure I mentioned it on here at some point and got told off for it so now I just leave chippings in a dumpy bag and add them to the compost when required. Good luck Renb - let us know how it goes with the wood chippings.
They need to be properly shredded and quite dry @gondor. If it's softer, greener material, it won't work so well, so it's best stored and left to rot down a bit. Difficult to judge without seeing it though.
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I used shredded branches direct as a mulch on my borders last autumn and it just went mouldy? Pretty sure I mentioned it on here at some point and got told off for it so now I just leave chippings in a dumpy bag and add them to the compost when required. Good luck Renb - let us know how it goes with the wood chippings.
If they go mouldy, that's just part of the decompostion process. You can go over it with a hoe just to get some air in amongst it.
After all that wonderful information I've just found out the tree guys aren't coming until the 27th OCTOBER ... not today!! Not sure how that mistake happened as I wrote the date down whilst on the phone to them, turns out the lady who was writing the diary has left so they can't check with her .... oh well, gives me another 4 weeks of leaf gathering for my mould bags, won't have to worry about too many green one's in the shredding bag ....
My arborist has had to postpone his visit planned for today too, must be some arborist event on that they all want to get to! I had got quite excited planning how I'd use a ton of chippings!
Lol cmarkr - they are convinced it was October all along but I sent them a photo of the date and price on my clipboard (I'm a list maker, got to write everything down with my memory), am hoping all the leaves will go brown and drop off (gonna use our Stihl blower/vacuum that we forgot we had) - that should be fun ....
Please do not compost cat or dog faeces … they can contain pathogens that are highly dangerous to human health and can cause catastrophic damage to the foetus.
See below
“…. Never use manures from meat-eating carnivores, pigs, or pets such as dogs and cats because they can host pathogens and parasites that may infect humans and cannot be composted away….”
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I've (fairly) recently realised I have HF in my garden. I would never use the infected section of a tree or shrub (usually the base of the trunk and / or roots) to make garden mulch. I would, however, shred and use the branches and upper parts of an infected tree as the fungus is unlikely to have reached those parts.
As for laying bark chippings: - some research by the RHS has indicated that a thick layer of uninfected bark chippings spread close to a source of HF can become infected and then act as an additional pathway for HF to spread around a border. That said - I still use bark nuggets around the garden - just not near very vulnerable plants such as viburnums.
Difficult to judge without seeing it though.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
You can go over it with a hoe just to get some air in amongst it.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.