sawdust

Sawdust, Great Stuff

Some years one of my last gardening activities for the season is ‘dusting. ‘Dusting can always wait till spring, but then the weather rushes me along with so many other activities. Now I’m not talking about ‘dusting in the usual sense, which is getting rid of it. The kind of ‘dusting I’m talking about is adding dust — as sawdust.

Sawdust is a terrific material for enriching the soil with humus, which sawdust eventually becomes. Leaves, straw, hay, and other once-living things can also do this and do it well, but sawdust has the advantage that it is weed-free and the small particles mix intimately with the soil. Another advantage of sawdust is that its beneficial effects in the ground last a relatively long time.

Sawdust mulched blueberries

Sawdust is also cheap, often free for the hauling, from sawmills, lumberyards, or from your or a friend’s workshop. Read more