Black Agrofibre For Mulching

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Modern summer residents use a wide variety of materials for mulching the soil - hay, grass, sawdust and even cardboard or old linoleum. But for a long time already there has been a material specially designed for these purposes - these are all kinds of film coatings, as well as black agrofibre. And if summer residents who have experience in using ordinary black film for mulching often complain that it quickly deteriorates, and the soil under it often heats up very much and can even become moldy, then in the case of agrofibre, everything is completely different

What is black agrofibre useful for?

Black agrofibre is a fairly durable non-woven material. The use of such material as mulch allows you to significantly reduce the amount of manual labor on the site, eliminate weeds, reduce the amount and volume of irrigation, significantly improve the quality of the soil, and also get a better and cleaner harvest, and much earlier.

How to mulch the beds?

Before you start mulching the beds with this material, you need to clear the place and properly prepare the soil. To this end, all twigs and pebbles are removed from the beds, and the beds themselves are either loosened or dug up. By the way, at this moment it is quite permissible to add mineral granular or organic fertilizers to the beds. Another good option is to add them directly to the water intended for irrigation.

Agrofibre is cut to fit the size of the beds available on the site, leaving small stocks of material at the edges. Then they spread it over the beds prepared in advance and fix it with bricks, large pebbles or unnecessary remnants of metal pipes. It is quite permissible to make studs stuck into the ground - as a rule, they are made of tough, durable wire. And some summer residents simply drop in the edges of the material or sprinkle them with earth.

Then, along the length of each bed, twine is pulled and immediately marked with chalk marks for future holes (such marks can be made without using a stretched twine, putting a special rail on the beds). In the marked areas, O-shaped holes are cut out or cross-shaped cuts are made, after which small indentations are dug in the same place for planting seedlings. At the same time, the distance is determined depending on the crops planted: for strawberries it is usually 25 cm, for tomatoes - 50 cm, for salad - 15 cm, etc. After sprinkling them with earth and watering, straighten the ends of the cut agrofibre or simply lightly sprinkle them with earth.

In the event that the decision to mulch the beds with agrofibre was made after planting the plants, you can proceed as follows: cover the beds with agrofibre and carefully make one cross-shaped incision over each plant. And after that, the plants, trying in every possible way not to damage them, are carefully threaded through the material. This, of course, is far from the best way, but it is quite acceptable to use it if necessary. By the way, the mulching method using black agrofibre can also be successfully used for trunks (to pre-prepare the soil before planting).

With the onset of spring, agrofibre will help the earth warm up much faster, and the amount of irrigation will decrease many times over - this is due to the fact that rainwater, which easily penetrates through the fiber, will evaporate from under it much more slowly, so the soil will remain moist for a long time.

Black agrofibre is especially praised by summer residents who grow strawberries, because berries grown in this way always turn out strong and clean, moreover, they practically do not attract slugs and are almost never damaged by the ill-fated gray rot. And strawberries mulched with such material always winters well!

In short, black agrofibre is a real find for those who want to save the maximum time spent on caring for planted crops. With proper use, this eco-friendly and convenient in all respects material can last for about three years!