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views on bark chippings
artychris
Posts: 60
Could anyone advise me as to whether there is any difference in the quality of wood bark chippings you can buy. I have decided to use it to turn a spot under the oak tree into a path, where the rain drips onto the grass, making it extremely muddy every year. Does the bark also need to be replaced often?
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Posts
I did a lot of research recently into bark chip when doing some landscaping on my daughter's garden. I think that for use on paths etc you can get away with the cheapest sort; the more expensive types are recommended for use in children's play areas etc, but for paths you just want something that will go down.
We use it here on our garden paths. I am always surprise how thickly one needs to lay it, especially if it is to cover a muddy area; don't skimp on the volume you buy, you won't regret laying it thicker rather than thinner. You might want to think about putting some membrane down first, if the path is to be quite neat and defined with edges - that will reduce the depth of chippings that you need, but obviously involves more work and the cost of the membrane.
We top ours up every three years or so. It needs topping up more often under the trees, because when the leaves fall we use a leaf-blower to gather them up and usually get a bit over-enthusiastic with the power switch..... which means a lot of bark gets blown off too.
The cheapest way to buy it is almost certainly in bulk bags delivered to your door - if you have a fairly big area to cover I'd strongly recommend that route. Search online for "bark chip" and there are lots of suppliers.
You'll find it smells strongly when first laid, and looks "stark" - but don't worry, the smell disappears after a week or so and the colours mute and blend in pretty quickly too.
Good luck, let us know how you get on!
Rosie
I like bark chippings but they do need renewing every few years as they rot down. We used very large gauge chippings as a weed suppressant mulch when we first made and planted long, front triangle purely because it can get very windy and I didn't want it blowing about. 15 years on most of the chippings have disintegrated but that's OK as the plants have matured and spread to suppress weeds themselves.
On other new beds and the paths in our woodland corner we used smaller gauge. We've had to renew it on the paths but not on the beds where plants are taking over the weed suppressing. I do find we still get plants and weeds seeding in the paths but they are easy enough to clean and great for collecting well rooted babies of wanted plants.
Cocoa husks are supposed to be good too but will smell of chocolate and should not be used if you have dogs.
I tend to use hard wood chippings for path as they don't rot down as fast as bark.
I've just created a new path at the bottom of my garden and set OH to do some research into finding the cheapest bark chips. He decided that Wickes "playsafe grade" bark chippings at 3 90 litre bags for £15 was cheaper than getting bulk delivery and they seem so far to be exactly what we wanted (but it's early days yet as they've only been down a couple of months). It did mean that he had to pick them up in several separate trips but therefore no delivery charges and we could keep getting more until we had enough.
I use bark chipping very successfully but I also use gravel as a mulch , have you thought about that as an alternative ?