Hello my readers! Many summer residents use on their personal plots pine or wood waste. They can become like organic fertilizer, and a protective litter for fruits. But, despite this, disputes regularly arise about whether sawdust in the garden is beneficial or harmful to plants?
There are many ways to use sawdust. They are mixed with compost, used for germinating seeds. But each case has its own secrets.
How do sawdust affect the soil?
To answer the question of how to use sawdust in the garden, you need to consider its effect on the soil.
The softer the soil, the more air it contains and the better it absorbs liquid. Organic additives help increase friability and prevent crust formation on the surface. Why are these techniques needed? Plants under such conditions develop full-fledged root system and grow faster.
You can mix semi-rotted or rotted sawdust into the soil brown. It will take a lot of time to prepare the material. You will have to wait more than 10 years. For a tree to rot, it needs living organic matter and moisture. But the process can be artificially accelerated. Urea can be added to the mass and used as mulch. Or let it rot by mixing it with manure or compost.
If this fertilizer is used in large quantities, additional lime or eggshells are added to the garden, as the acidity increases. This is perhaps the only disadvantage of using sawdust.
Mulching with sawdust
Mulching will help with the following problems:
- In regions where drought lasts for a long time, it can protect the soil from overheating and excessive loss of moisture. For example, this is how to protect tomato plantings.
- This method is also useful for strawberries. Mulch poured under the bush protects the berries from dirt, rot and slugs.
- Weeds grow through this layer very poorly.
- Mulch protects beneficial bacteria at the planting site from the sun. Microorganisms reproduce better in it and become more active.
Not only rotted sawdust, but also fresh sawdust is suitable for mulching. They are poured in raspberry fields, on beds and under plant bushes in a layer of 3-5 centimeters. Fresh material is pre-enriched with nitrogen. To do this, pour it onto a spread film (3 buckets), add 200 g of urea and moisten it with 10 liters of water. New sawdust is poured on top and all steps are repeated. The resulting fertilizer is covered with film for two weeks.
Mulching is used at the beginning of summer so that earthworms can mix everything with the soil by autumn.
Fertilizer for beds
The use of sawdust as fertilizer is also quite common. To do this, use mulch prepared earlier. It is necessary to take into account that if at the end of summer the layers of soil and fertilizer are not mixed, a vegetable garden is needed. Otherwise, rainwater will not penetrate well into the soil.
Compost
To the question “can sawdust be used with compost”, many summer residents answer positively. To do this, rotted sawdust is mixed with manure - 100 kg and bird droppings - 10 kg and left to ferment for a year. To moisten the mass, water or liquid food waste is added.
Using material to form beds
What sawdust can be used in the garden and why is often of interest to many. Another option for use is that they can be used to easily form ridges. Any wood waste is suitable for this. First, long furrows are dug and the soil is piled up along them. The walkable depressions are filled with small shavings, and the excavated soil is used for growing vegetables.
Using sawdust you can form high bed. First, a little soil is removed from the future planting site. Lay a layer of leaves or straw, then mulch, again the first components and cover with the removed substrate. To prevent shedding, a barrier is made from the boards. Berries and vegetables grow very well on such an organic bed.
Sawdust for growing potatoes
To get an early potato harvest, you can use sawdust. Before planting (2 weeks before), you need to pour them into boxes in a 10-centimeter layer, put the sprouted vegetables and fill the top completely with the same sawdust.
The workpieces should be stored at a temperature no higher than 20 degrees and the substrate should be kept moist. It should be moderately moist and not dry out.
When the garden warms up and the potatoes grow 10 cm, the entire contents of the boxes are transferred to the holes, then watered generously with mineral fertilizers. Then the tubers are dug in, covered with straw and insulated with film. This will bring the harvest forward by several weeks.
You can find out another way to use sawdust for sprouting potatoes.
Whether or not sawdust can be used in the garden to fertilize the soil is a favorite topic of discussion among gardeners and gardeners. Opinions on this matter are completely opposite: some summer residents praise sawdust and use it to the fullest, others are categorically against such “recklessness.” Who's right here?
With proper preparation, using sawdust as fertilizer is certainly possible. And not only. Sawdust, it turns out, is generally a wonderful help in the household. There are a lot of options for using them, we counted a damn dozen...
Sawdust has many properties that are necessary and useful for gardeners. For example, they are a good soil loosener, which improves its structure and prevents cracking and crusting. In addition, sawdust is able to absorb and retain liquid, which makes it possible to use it where it is necessary to reduce humidity. Sawdust can insulate, disinfect, decorate, and protect.
Finally, let's not forget that sawdust is wood waste. That is, real organic matter that is processed by soil microorganisms into nutrients, necessary for everything growing on earth. And like any other organic matter, sawdust should not be sent to landfills, but to garden beds.
How to avoid problems when using sawdust in the garden
But if sawdust is so beautiful, why are there people against using it? There are actually two reasons for distrust of sawdust: adding fresh sawdust increases the acidity of the soil and sawdust absorbs nitrogen from the soil when decomposing.
Both of these problems can be solved. The very first solution is to use sawdust for crops that grow well in acidic soils (pH 5.5-6.0). And there are quite a lot of them: Japanese quince, barberry, blueberries, honeysuckle, viburnum, potatoes, dogwood, cranberries, carrots, cucumbers, rhubarb, radishes, turnips, rosemary, tomatoes, pumpkin, conifers, spinach, sorrel.
If you don’t want to take risks with fresh sawdust, their oxidizing ability needs to be neutralized. To do this, sawdust is mixed with “alkaline” materials: ash, lime, eggshell, dolomite flour, crushed chalk or fertilizers (superphosphate, potassium chloride, sodium or calcium nitrate, potassium or ammonium sulfate).
The second problem is even easier to solve. Since sawdust needs nitrogen so much, why not just add it to it? Let's add it! A bucket of sawdust usually takes 200 grams nitrogen fertilizers(for example, urea) dissolved in water. Water is required in this case so that the sawdust is well saturated.
Those who don't recognize mineral fertilizers, mix sawdust with freshly cut grass, manure, bird or rabbit droppings, spill them or other grass. And the problem of “pulling” nitrogen is no longer there.
How to put all this into practice? We take a large piece of film and spread it on the area. Pour sawdust mixed with ash onto the film. For each bucket of sawdust we take ten liters of water and two hundred grams of urea. Dissolve the urea in water, pour in the sawdust, cover the top with a second piece of film, press the film down so it doesn’t blow away. We leave our mixture in this form for two to three weeks. Is there no room for such a design? No problem. The prepared sawdust can be placed in black garbage bags and closed tightly.
After the due date, we will receive so-called rotted sawdust. You can now forget about all the disadvantages of fresh sawdust.
13 ways to use sawdust in the country
Method 1. Mulching
Using sawdust as mulch is the very first thing that comes to mind. It is enough to prepare them as described above, and the sawdust is completely ready to work as a mulching material. The soil under the crops is covered with a layer of sawdust of 3-5 centimeters. Strawberries, strawberries, garlic and raspberries respond especially well to mulching with sawdust.
It is best to mulch with sawdust in spring and early summer, then by the end of the season you will not find sawdust in the garden bed - it will have time to rot. A thick layer of sawdust mulch in the second half of summer is undesirable; it will prevent the evaporation of excess moisture from the soil, which, in turn, will not allow plants to properly prepare for winter.
Method 2. Composting
Another obvious option for using sawdust in the garden is to add it to Sawdust - a great carbon component for making compost, and mixed with plant residues, kitchen waste, grass or manure, they will quickly turn into natural organic fertilizer.
You can compost sawdust “without impurities.” To do this, you will have to dig a hole a meter deep, fill it with fresh sawdust, and sprinkle lime, ash, etc. on top. In two years, the sawdust will rot and you can safely fertilize the beds with it.
Method 3. Germination of seeds and tubers
For many gardeners, sawdust serves as a substrate for germinating seeds and tubers. Sawdust is poured into a thin layer at the bottom of the container and the seeds are laid out on it. Sprinkle another layer of sawdust on top, also thin. Cover the structure with film and send it to a dark, warm place. When shoots appear, the film is removed, the container is exposed to light, and the sawdust is lightly sprinkled with soil. With the appearance of the first true leaf, the seedlings dive into separate ones.
To germinate potatoes, sawdust is moistened with water and poured into a box with a ten-centimeter layer. Seed tubers are laid on sawdust and sprinkled with another smaller layer of sawdust - 2-3 centimeters. From time to time, spray the contents of the boxes with water. When the tubers produce sprouts 6-8 centimeters long, they can be planted in the ground.
In addition, some small seeds (for example,) are mixed with sawdust when sowing for better distribution along the furrow.
Method 4. Construction of beds
Sawdust can be used for - here any organic matter is needed and important. With the help of sawdust, ridges located in the lowlands are also raised. This is done like this: at the site of the future bed, they dig a trench 25 centimeters deep and fill it with sawdust mixed with lime, ash, etc. The soil dug from the trench is placed on top. This way the bed becomes higher, and the sawdust inside will not only supply nutrients to the plants, but also retain excess moisture.
Method 5. Covering furrows and paths
Sawdust can serve as an excellent covering for walkways between beds and any other paths. The rows filled with sawdust look beautiful; you can walk on them after rain without fear of getting your shoes dirty. In addition, sawdust is well compressed, preventing weeds from growing. They protect the soil from drying out and nourish it with organic matter. You can also sprinkle sawdust on the paths in icy conditions!
Method 6. Storing vegetables
Carrots, cabbage and apples are well stored in sawdust. And if you decide to make your own for storing crops on the balcony, sawdust can be useful as insulation.
Method 7. Preparing soil for seedlings
Sawdust is one of the components of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and eggplants. Let's not forget that ONLY rotted sawdust is used to prepare seedling soil.
Method 8. Growing mushrooms
Mushroom growing is very interesting. On fresh sawdust of deciduous trees (oak, birch, willow, aspen, poplar, maple) oyster mushrooms work well. However, the technology for growing mushrooms is far from simple, and in order to become an ideal substrate for mycelium, sawdust must undergo multi-stage preparation.
Method 9. Insulation of fruit trees
If you fill plastic bags with sawdust and place them around young fruit trees, the latter will be reliably insulated for the winter. Sawdust in bags will not get wet, will not freeze, and will not attract rodents. Sawdust is very popular as insulation for grapevine: a specially made box without a bottom is placed on top of the plant, filled with sawdust and covered with film on top.
Please note that in both cases the sawdust is covered with polyethylene. This is important. Just like that, without any shelter, sawdust poured onto the plant will get wet over the winter and then turn into an ice block.
Method 10. Animal bedding
The best sawdust for this purpose is sawdust fruit trees. Using shavings and sawdust as bedding for animals is beneficial from all angles. Wood waste is cheap (and often free), it insulates the floor, and it is hygienic due to its absorbent properties. In addition, such litter, having served for its intended purpose, will become an effective fertilizer.
Method 11. Smoking
Those who smoke meat, fish or lard in the country will always find a use for sawdust, wood chips and shavings. True, not all sawdust is suitable for a smokehouse, but only certain types of wood. Juniper and alder wood chips are most suitable for smoking. Sometimes ash, hazel, pear, maple, oak and apple are used. Each tree gives the finished dish its own aroma, so some gourmets prepare special smoking mixtures from several species. It is recommended to make wood chips and shavings for smoking from branches cut in the spring, for example, during routine pruning.
Method 12. Construction and finishing
Many people probably know that sawdust can be mixed into concrete. Sawdust concrete or a mixture of clay and sawdust is used to plaster garden houses and gazebos. Concrete with sawdust can be used to make bricks or building blocks. Sawdust is also used as insulating material for walls and floors.
Method 13. Creativity
Both children and adults love to use sawdust for crafts. Firstly, they can serve as an excellent material for stuffing toys, pillows, the body of a stuffed animal, or any other elements. country decor. Secondly, sawdust can be made colored! They are mixed with a gouache solution and dried well. And from multi-colored sawdust they make both appliqués with children and the most complex “sawdust carpets”. For example, these: 
We wish you success and great harvests!
- Harm from wood waste
- What sawdust should I use?
- Several fertilizer recipes
- Recipe 1: Wood and Ash
- Fresh sawdust fertilizer
- Mulching according to the rules
- Strawberries and wild strawberries
- How to cover roses
- Sawdust for seedlings
Mulching is the surface covering of garden soil with mulch, which can be crushed bark, pine needles, sawdust, etc. natural materials. This agrotechnical technique helps to avoid many health problems cultivated plants on the ground and in the greenhouse. Using sawdust as mulch leads to amazing results in plant development, but only if certain rules are followed.
Properties of wood chips and shavings
Sawdust mulch is suitable for use on all types of soil.
What's good about this material:
- It does not release moisture from the ground, thereby helping to maintain the balance of water during dry periods and in hot areas.
- Prevents weeds from germinating. This is one of the main reasons for using wood waste as mulch.
- Fresh sawdust is used as bedding for berries - the smell of the tree repels some pests from the fruit, and small chips keep strawberries and wild strawberries clean.
- Mulching the soil allows the roots of some plants to survive the winter.
- Wood chips serve as fertilizer. True, for this you need to fulfill some conditions.
It is worth noting that mulching with sawdust cannot be done in the form in which it is. The fact is that wood does not saturate the soil with useful substances, but, on the contrary, draws them out, like a sponge. Sawdust material becomes useful if it is added to the main mixtures for fertilizer or kept for a year or two in compost heap. At this time, bacteria settle on the surface of the chips, which saturate the wood with useful microelements released during rotting and proliferation of microflora.
What are the benefits and possible harm?
Sawdust is often used by gardeners to improve the quality of life of plants, but people do not always know about the true benefits of the intake and are unable to accurately assess its harm. However, in most cases it still works out positive effect from their use.
Advantages of sawdust:
- With proper preparation, you get excellent humus, similar in properties to traditional manure, which, as you know, costs a lot.
- Sawdust scattered on paths in the garden prevents the spread of weeds.
- Retain moisture in the soil, especially in spring. To do this, you need to mulch the ground in the fall.
- Promote natural soil aeration several years after use.
- Coniferous shavings and wood chips practically do not tolerate pathogenic microbes, which eliminates the risk of plant infection.
Harm from wood waste
- Sawdust in its pure form is not a fertilizer. They absorb minerals from the soil, and the soil becomes depleted. Nitrogen, necessary for the life of microorganisms, is drawn from the fertile layer.
- Fresh sawdust oxidizes the soil.
- The use of sawdust of unknown origin can lead to infection of plants with diseases. To eliminate this risk, you should not take material from questionable sources.
What sawdust should I use?
Shavings different trees Not suitable for all plants:
- Waste from deciduous trees is good for crops, except.
- Coniferous species saturate the soil with acid, therefore they are accepted only by lovers of such an environment - tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots and others.
Several fertilizer recipes
Sawdust in its pure form is used only for filling paths in order to retain moisture and stop the development of weeds. In other cases, preparation of raw materials is required.
For sawdust in the garden to become useful, it needs to rot.. To achieve the required condition, they will have to lie in a pile for at least 10 years while bacteria process the wood into a useful substrate. You can speed up the process by making compost from sawdust. In combination with manure and additional additives, the fertilizer matures faster due to thermoregulation in the desired range and maintaining a sufficient level of moisture.
We offer several recipes for preparing fertilizer from sawdust, which is used by gardeners throughout the country. It is recommended to make a bookmark from the beginning of summer as the necessary material becomes available.
Recipe 1: Wood and Ash
Stack:
- Wood sawdust – 200 kg;
- Urea, rich in nitrogen (up to 47%) – 2.5 kg per heap;
- Ash required to alkalize the soil – 10 kg;
- Water – 50 liters;
- Grass, food waste and sewage – up to 100 kg.
The shavings and grass are laid in layers, ash is added and the “pie” is filled with urea dissolved in water. You can cover the pile with polyethylene film, but small pores should remain on the surface: this way the temperature and humidity level will be optimal, and oxygen access will remain.
Recipe 2: Organically Enriched
For poor soil that requires a significant dose of fertilizer, prepare the following compost from sawdust:
- Wood waste – 200 kg;
- Cow dung – 50 kg;
- Fresh cut grass – 100 kg;
- Organic waste (food, feces) – 30 kg;
- Humates – 1 drop per 100 liters of water (no more).
When this fertilizer ripens, a significant amount of nitrogen is released.
Fresh sawdust fertilizer
As already mentioned, fresh sawdust does not benefit the soil as a fertilizer for the garden. If you have not done composting in advance, but it is necessary to saturate the soil, use a sawdust mixture with the following additives on a bucket of wood chips:
- Ammonium nitrate – 40 g;
- Granulated superphosphate – 30 g;
- Slaked lime – 120 g (glass);
- Calcium chloride – 10 g.
The mixture needs to be infused for 2 weeks. To do this, spread plastic outside and scatter the ingredients on it.
Mix, leave to highlight necessary elements and conducting chemical reactions. After this, add the resulting mixture to the soil when digging the beds. The soil will receive a sufficient dose of ammonia, the acid-base balance of the soil will be leveled, and the release of useful substances will occur immediately after the first watering. The soil should be fertilized in the amount of 2–3 buckets per 1 square meter plot. This procedure promotes natural loosening of the soil.
Mulching according to the rules
Sawdust at the dacha is useful not only for speeding up the composting process, but also for winter shelter for plants, fertilizing them and protecting them from pests.
It is good to use prepared sawdust as mulch in the first half of summer, when seedlings and plants are just gaining strength and need protection from weeds, loss of soil moisture and disease attacks. By mid-summer, there will be no obvious trace left of the powder - it will be mixed with the soil by rain and worms.
Basically, sawdust saturated with fertilizers is lined in the passages. This must be done between beds with tomatoes, potato rows and other plants.
Other vegetables grown in the garden - onions, carrots, beets, garlic, turnips - also need protective powder. It needs to be done after picking, when the plantings are thinned out and have reached a height of 5–7 cm, they are covered with a layer of sawdust of 3–4 cm.
Raspberries are one of the main lovers of mulching in the garden. It is necessary to preserve the soil moisture necessary for setting berries. Prepared sawdust is generously poured under the bushes.
Strawberries and wild strawberries
Is it possible to mulch strawberries with sawdust? The answer is clear - you need it, just like strawberries. This procedure is useful for berries:
- Sawdust maintains the moisture balance in the soil.
- Tender fruits remain clean without touching the ground.
- Slugs and snails do not crawl onto the berries.
For mulching, you need clean sawdust without impurities, but before the procedure it is important to saturate the soil with minerals and fertilize it well to prevent depletion of the fertile layer. The material used can be mixed with urea in the above proportions.
The sawdust is moistened and laid out under the bushes, under each branch and between the stems. The layer thickness should be 5–7 cm. This work is presented in the video.
The bedding is done when the seedlings have already taken root and gained a height of more than 7 cm. Mulching strawberries with sawdust for the winter will help perennial plant It’s better to survive the cold and keep the root system intact.
How to cover roses
Gardeners say: “A rose is a child of manure,” because sawdust is necessary for it as fertilizer, but it is not suitable as a protective layer. Such mulch does not have sufficient heat-retaining properties.
Covering roses with sawdust can only be used for wintering in combination with other, more effective materials. The expert will talk about this in detail in the video.
Sawdust for seedlings
Tomatoes and other seedlings now more often appear in the garden not as seeds, but as ready-made shoots. They can also be bred in small wood waste - such an environment is more favorable for the delicate seed than soil.
How to organize the process correctly:
- Moistened small shavings are poured into a flat container.
- They plant the seeds and generously fill them with fertilizer, since there is nothing nutritious in the sawdust.
- Cover with film, make holes for air and expose to the sun.
- When sprouts appear, soil is poured on top so that the plant gets used to it.
Then, as they grow, the seedlings are transferred to a separate pot with garden soil.
The advantage of germinating seeds in wood material– a loose environment that allows the root system of seedlings to develop intensively, but only if there is a sufficient supply of nutrients.
Usually the owner is at least small area tries to grow his own vegetables or fruits whenever possible. After all, they don’t have chemicals, which are used to improve crop yields. In addition, even a novice gardener has many home remedies in his arsenal that lead to a similar result, but are absolutely safe. Among them, a popular method is to use sawdust. But is it really effective? That’s what worries inexperienced gardeners. So, let's figure out what is more beneficial or harmful from using sawdust in the garden.
Sawdust in the garden - benefits
In general, sawdust is small, powdery wood particles that appear when sawing wood. In fact, it is wood processing waste, which experienced gardeners prefer to widely use in gardening.
If we talk about why sawdust is needed in the garden, the range of its applications is quite wide. Firstly, sawdust- This is an excellent material for loosening dense, oily soil. In it, practically no air enters the root system, that is, aeration does not occur. Of course, such a situation cannot but affect the normal development of plants. You can introduce sawdust into the soil by scattering it on the ground or digging it up. The main advantage of this baking powder is the absence of weed seeds.
The use of sawdust in the garden is shown in the form. After rain or watering, sawdust is sprinkled under bushes or on vegetable beds in a layer of up to 4-5 cm. This mulching is indicated for the first two summer months. In August, sawdust is not used for this purpose so that perennial plants can prepare for the cold.
Another purpose for which you can buy sawdust for the garden is that it is a good material for fertilizer. And when using them in this capacity, it is worth considering many nuances. First, never use fresh wood waste. The fact is that such sawdust practically does not contain substances useful for plants, but on the contrary, they are washed out of the soil important element– nitrogen. That is why it is recommended to first bring the sawdust to a boil, when the sawdust undergoes decomposition and acquires various microorganisms beneficial to the flora. The approximate time for sawdust to rot is 4-6 months. They are placed in a container, systematically watered with a solution (20 g per bucket of water) and covered with a thick film. When such compost is ready, by autumn it is added to the soil for digging.
Sawdust for the garden - harmful
With all the advantages, one cannot help but say a few words about whether sawdust is harmful to the garden. And there are reasons for this, since some gardeners were dissatisfied with the experience of using wood waste in their own plots, noting a decrease in yield. In reality, dacha owners simply did not have the necessary information and therefore made mistakes.
For example, it was already indicated above that only rotted sawdust should be used as fertilizer. If you want to loosen the soil with sawdust, do not forget to liming it, 
mixed with dolomite flour. Otherwise, the soils will become acidic, which is extremely unacceptable for such agricultural crops as cabbage, beets, onions, peppers, and asparagus.
It is also worth limiting the use of coniferous sawdust for the garden, in which the concentration of resins is much higher than that of deciduous sawdust. In addition, their overheating lasts twice as long - about a year.
In addition, when purchasing sawdust for the garden, make sure that it was not obtained from wooden furniture, coated with varnish or other chemical compounds. Otherwise, the plants will be truly harmed.
» Medicines
Inexpensive and accessible natural material– sawdust. They can be purchased at the nearest sawmill, obtained at own plot during construction, sawing wood. Farmers have found many ways to benefit from this waste. However, do not forget that they can also cause harm. Later in the article, let's take a closer look at such aspects as the benefits and harms of using sawdust in the garden. And also how you can fertilize or treat beds with them.
Sawdust and shavings are sometimes burned to produce mineral fertilizer - wood ash. But this is how valuable organic matter evaporates, the voluminous loose substance disappears. It's better to do it differently:
- Mulching.
- Compost.
- Adding to soil and greenhouses.
- Neutralizer of harmful substances.
- Acidifier.
- Dehumidifier.
- Temperature insulator.
- Pest repeller.
- Additive to seedling soils.
- Substrate for mycelium, germination of seeds and tubers, forcing flowers and herbs.
- Wednesday for winter storage rhizomes and tubers.
- Covering garden paths.
- Bedding in livestock and poultry farming, in a dog kennel.
- Filler in a country toilet.
- Padding material garden scarecrow, garden furniture and pillows.
- Construction raw materials (insulator, insulation, filler for sawdust concrete).
- Fuel in heating boilers.
- Source of smoke in the smokehouse.
Sawdust close up Types of small wood waste
Small waste from cutting wood is divided into shavings, large and small fractions. There are also differences in the type of wood: from coniferous or from deciduous species. Sometimes the differences are important, for example: leaf waste rots faster; Coniferous trees are not suitable for smoking products, etc. But any organic matter is valuable. It is advisable to treat the sawdust before use.
Benefits and harms
- The presence of impurities such as creolin, chemical oils, paint particles, glue, and gasoline is dangerous for humans and the environment. That's why you need to take pure wood products, and not chipboard or sleepers.
- Resinous substances inhibit seed germination and plant development. This deficiency is neutralized by scalding the substrate with boiling water, as well as by composting.
- Unrotted organic matter (when introduced into the soil and onto its surface) begins to decompose by microorganisms that intensively consume soil nitrogen. Because of this, plants experience nitrogen starvation - they turn pale and develop worse. Therefore, it is recommended to put only rotten sawdust in the ground, and when mulching with fresh sawdust, flavor it with nitrogen fertilizers.
- Sawdust compost acidifies the soil. Simultaneous alkalization is necessary (in the fall - with lime, in the spring - with dolomite flour, ash).
- Seedling sawdust soils dry out too quickly. It is necessary to follow the recommended proportions of components and monitor regular watering.
Mulching
Sawdust mulch is a cheap and convenient option. They cover it at the dacha:
- surface of beds with vegetables and strawberries
- soil in raspberry gardens, flower beds
- trunk circles in fruit and berry garden
Sawdust in bags, ready for soil mulching The layer thickness can be from 4 to 20 cm.
Mulch is applied in the spring or early summer, and for fruit and berry and ornamental crops it can also be applied in the fall. At the beginning of the season, rotted sawdust compost from last year or the year before is used; at the end of the season, organic matter from spring composting is suitable.
It is also possible to mulch with fresh sawdust. They are pre-cooked: soaked in a strong solution of nitrogen fertilizers. To do this, 3 buckets of mulching material are filled with 10 liters of water, where a quarter kilogram of urea or saltpeter is dissolved. It is best if this mixture sits for a couple of weeks (covered with polyethylene) before mulching, after which you can sprinkle it on the beds. Mineral fertilizers can be replaced with fresh manure or droppings (2 liters), but such mulch is not suitable for strawberries and some vegetables (for hygienic reasons).
Advantages of sawdust mulch
- the material is not contaminated with weed seeds
- gradually rotting, the mulch enriches the soil with organic matter
- moisture is saved
- no soil crust and erosion
- roots are insulated, temperature changes are smoothed out
- comfortable for beneficial soil inhabitants (microorganisms, earthworms)
- makes it difficult for some pests to escape
- no dirty splashes from rain and watering – cleaner products and fewer diseases
- inhibits weed growth
- ridges, garden, flower beds look well-groomed and beautiful
Mulching a potato bed with sawdust How to fertilize with compost
The best option for sawdust disposal is proper composting. Simply poured out in a large heap, they will rot for several years (especially from coniferous trees). Rotting is accelerated by layer-by-layer mixing with substances such as
- manure, droppings
- feces
- foliage
- herbal humus
- dolomite flour, ash.
The mass is regularly shoveled and spilled with water, as well as solutions of mineral fertilizers, herbal infusions, biological preparations (Baikal, Flumb Super, Shining). The process of compost maturation usually lasts from six months to two to three years. The minimum waiting period is 2 months.
Mixed compost is considered the best organic-mineral fertilizer for all crops.
Adding to soil and greenhouses
The fertilizer “works” in the soil for 3-5 years: it nourishes plants and loosens heavy loams.
Small wood waste is also used to add biofuel to greenhouses. They are mixed: fresh sawdust with fresh manure, rotted with rotted manure (in a 1:1 ratio).
Neutralizer of harmful substances
A fresh mass of small wood waste serves as an “ambulance” in emergency situations. It is added to the soil if an excess of nitrogen and other fertilizers is noticed. This way the plants will avoid fattening, accumulation of nitrates and harmful salts.
Acidifier in garden beds
Rotten sawdust is useful when planting and mulching those plants that love increased acidity soil (hydrangeas, rhododendrons, azaleas, heathers, blueberries).
Pine sawdust as a desiccant
Fresh sawdust can absorb an amount of liquid that is 5 times its volume. They are good for filling drainage ditches and paths between high ridges in wetlands.
Temperature insulator
In regions where in winter low temperatures, dry sawdust is used to protect the root zone and branches of shrubs (grapes, hydrangea, roses, clematis) from freezing, planting winter garlic and perennial flowers (lilies, irises, chrysanthemums). To avoid overheating, the shelter is made when sub-zero temperatures occur, and the opening is made earlier in the spring. To protect against dampness, a waterproof material (polyethylene, roofing felt, etc.) is placed on top.
Some fruit and berry crops bloom very early, and the ovaries freeze. If the root zone is covered with a thick layer of sawdust, then the trees and shrubs will wake up later. Flowering will be postponed to a more comfortable time.
Pest repeller for garden plots
Small wood waste is impregnated with tar or gasoline and laid out to repel rodents, onion and carrot flies.
Adding prickly sawdust makes it difficult for snails and slugs to move around. The resinous aroma partially protects plants from attack by beetles (Colorado beetle, raspberry beetle, flower beetle, weevil).
Additive to seedling soils
A soil substrate containing from 10 to 50% rotted sawdust compost is recommended for
- seedlings of vegetable and flower crops
- rooting cuttings and strawberry mustaches
- growing seedlings with a closed root system.
Other components of such soil are garden soil, peat, and a little sand. Loose soil requires frequent watering or special additives that retain moisture (hydrogel, vermiculite, coconut substrate).
Unrotted organic matter can cause starvation of young plants. If the foliage has turned pale, then you need to give nitrogen-phosphorus fertilizing.
Using substrate as fertilizer
Seeds of cucumbers (as well as zucchini, pumpkin, melons and watermelons) are germinated in fresh small sawdust and seedlings are kept. The substrate is poured with boiling water, then the water is immediately drained. The procedure is repeated twice to wash off the resinous substances. The warm, wet mass is laid out in a layer of 6 cm, and dry seeds are placed into it at a depth of 1.5 cm (at a distance of 3 cm from each other). The crops are covered with film and placed in a warm place. The seedlings “shoot” after 3-4 days. The seedlings are ready for planting in two weeks.
In sawdust you can force onions and tulip flowers. The substrate must first be spilled with boiling water and fertilized with a complex fertilizer with a predominance of nitrogen. Potato and dahlia tubers are sprouted in the same way before planting.
Average fraction of crushed wood deciduous trees used for artificial breeding mushrooms such as oyster mushrooms.
Medium for winter storage of rhizomes and tubers
In autumn, gardeners dig up dahlia tubers, calla lilies and begonias, and canna rhizomes. They are stored in a cellar or refrigerator, sprinkled with dry, fresh sawdust. Resinous components inhibit rotting.
Farmers are zealous and creative people. They have the ability to convert waste into income, especially when it comes to organics. As you can see, using pine or any other sawdust can be beneficial in the right hands.