Wood Chipping
Just one of the services Nature’s Shade provides is the sale and delivery of wood chips. We provide delivery of this natural mulch in Toronto and the surrounding area.
What are wood chips?
Wood chips are just what they sound like. They are small chips of wood. When a tree is removed, it is ground into small pieces via a wood chipper. This is done for easier transportation. It is a lot easier to move a container of wood chips than chunks of a tree. The wood found in wood chips will be a combination of branches, bark, and trunk. The chips will be of different sizes, ranging from dust to 2-inch pieces. However, there won’t be any overly large pieces.
Uses of wood chips
As mulch for your garden
After you have planted your flowers, many expert gardeners will then apply a layer of mulch, which can be in the form of wood chips. This mulch acts as a barrier and an extra level of protection for your prized flowers. Mulch keeps moisture in your soil because the sun isn’t able to penetrate the soil underneath it. Mulch can also keep weeds at bay as there is less room for them to grow. Furthermore, mulch helps insulate your garden during winter, preserving your perennials and bulbs so that they are able to come back the following spring.
As a surface for a play area
Perhaps you have a swing set or climbing apparatus in your backyard. Wood chips make an excellent ground covering. They are more forgiving than hard-packed dirt or even grass, so if your little one happens to fall, they have an extra layer of protection. Furthermore, wood chips are fun to play with. Giving your child an extra play source means more time spent outside, which is not only fun, but healthy, too.
As layers in a raised garden bed
Raised garden beds are ideal if you are planting vegetables. If your soil isn’t good, you can use a raised garden bed and support your plants with new, nutrient-rich soil. However, it can cost a lot of money to fill raised garden beds with new soil. Wood chips are a good, cheap part of any raised garden bed. To support your vegetables, you will want to use different materials. This should be layers of soil, brown organic matter, and green organic matter. Wood chips can take the place of a brown organic level. They will break down, allowing extra nutrients to enter the soil, such as nitrogen.
A good compost bin is a mixture of brown and green organic matter. However, it is usually easier to find green matter, especially in the summer. Common green organic matter is all the vegetable and fruit scraps from your kitchen. Common brown matter is dried leaves, which don’t become available until Fall. You can get a mulch delivery of wood chips and store them next to your compost. Then, when you need to even out your bin, you can simply add in wood chips. The result will be a more nutrient-dense compost that your garden will thrive on.
As a path to walk on
Wood chips are a great material to use when creating a path in your garden. They suppress the growth of weeds and are a nice, natural texture to walk on. The bonus is that if you need to freshen up your path over the years, you can simply ask for another mulch delivery to add more depth to your path.
FAQs
Wood chips decompose over time, which is why they’re great for gardens and composts. However, as they decompose they become a perfect breeding ground for fungus. While the fungi wood chips attract aren’t harmful, it is another element in your garden you may not have planned for.
If wood chips are buried, such as in a raised garden bed or in a compost bin, they can take as little as three months to decompose. Heat speeds up the process. Wood chips that sit atop the ground will take one to two years to break down. Therefore if you are using wood chips in your garden or as a pathway, you will need to replenish them at least every year.
Wood chips are a mixture of different tree types from different people’s properties. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell if they have been sprayed with chemicals in the past. If you are using wood chips as an aesthetic enhancement, this isn’t much of a concern. If you are using wood chips in your garden, you may want to get them tested, just in case.
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We are a professional, family run business dedicated to the health of trees and the surrounding environment. We care about the health of your trees, shrubs and plants. Most of all, we truly appreciate your customers. We provide services to accommodate your most creative outdoor ideas to emergency storm damage.
