Mulch, zero waste and free!

Having a garden, even a small one, is such a joy! But doing so without creating plastic has had some of its own challenges. Today’s challenge is about mulch. Read my post about potting soil here. If you need a ton of mulch (like, literally, a ton), scroll down to the end of the post. But if you just need a few bags worth or a pickup truck’s worth, keep reading.

You need mulch in your garden to help keep the soil moist and reduce the amount of water you use. It also adds organic matter as it breaks down. Some people use straw, and if you find a zero waste way to get straw, comment below!

I used to spend our hard-earned money to buy mulch in plastic bags. Since plastic doesn’t break down, every bag of mulch I’ve ever bought is still out there somewhere. Yikes! Time to find a better solution.

The good news is, it is easy to get plastic free mulch in Chattanooga. And on top of that, it is free!

Any person with a Chattanooga address can get free mulch from the Chattanooga Wood Recycling center run by the city. They take the tree limbs and yard clippings from residents and chip it. Then they put it in big piles and let it age for a while. The mulch is good quality. The wood is shredded into small pieces and they often have the choice between light colored and dark colored.

If you need a lot, borrow a truck from a friend and get a whole load. They weigh your truck on a giant drive-on scale before an after, as you are limited to one ton per day (yes, one ton!).

If you only need a little, do what I did:

I pulled up to the little station house and told the guy I was there to get some mulch. He looked curiously at my little Prius, with 2 little girls strapped in carseats in the back and asked me “What are you going to put it in?” 🙂 I had a empty storage tote and 5 gallon bucket in my trunk. He let me skip weighing in and out and told me to just pick whichever pile I wanted to fill my containers.

I drove up right next to a pile of mulch as tall as a one story house. I had forgotten a shovel, but one of the workers came over and helped me fill it up after watching me pitifully fill it with my bare hands. It took only a few minutes and I had all the mulch I wanted. For free!

A note to those of you who live outside the city: You can still get mulch at the same place, there is just a small fee. It costs $20 per ton. Yes, again, per ton–which is about a full pickup truck load! That beats the big box store price by a mile! 

Here is the website for the Wood Recycle Center

Getting a TON of wood chips for free

If you are in need of a huge pile of mulch, then Chip Drop might be a good option. Chip Drop is a free service that connects tree service companies with people who need wood chips. Often, companies have to pay to off-load their wood chips after removing a tree. They pay a small fee instead to use the website to find people who will take their wood chips for them. The only catch is that you have to take the entire truckload! We have done this several times a below is one of the piles we received! It was lots of fun for the kids to play on! And it is usually a mix of wood with leaves, which is great for improving your soil’s nutrients.

And finally, if you would like to have a bulk delivery of mulch directly to your house, but don’t want to wait for a Chip Drop and/or don’t have room for a whole truck load. Or, if you are trying to revitalize your soil with a high-quality, nutritionally dense wood chip layer, then I would recommend getting a load of wood chips from Chattanooga Hardwood. All of the mulch is sourced from hardwood trees within 50 miles of Chattanooga. The mulch is “double ground” and allowed to sit in large piles to make sure there are no tree diseases that will be passed along, and it is MUCH more nutritious that the mulch you would be able to buy at a big-box store. They allow you to come and pick it up in the back of a truck or trailer, or they can deliver.

The main point of this blog post is that you do not need to buy mulch in plastic bags! And rather than using your hard earned money to support over-priced big box stores, there are so many local options that are less expensive (if not free!) which also support our local Chattanooga economy and provide you with a more high-quality mulch.