When we lived in Louisiana, that's all you ever saw down there for mulch. I remember my parents sending out into the pine woods to rake the pine straw for their flower beds.

They say the needles may help deter slugs, but I'm not so sure this is true. The slugs under my pine trees get holes just like everywhere else.

I really think it's just more of a regional thing. We're big into mulch here in Ohio too.

My parents live in Arkansas now, and I usually don't see any type of mulch in the gardens or landscaping around their neigborhoods.

I prefer the look of shredded bark mulch myself, but lots of people (and commercial landscaping) use pine straw here in North Carolina, it's true. It's also something a lot of people in Georgia use. My aunt grows a big selection of daylilies, and she uses pine straw in those beds. In other beds, she uses bark. And when I was out in Seattle, I noticed that people tend to not use any mulch at all. But if you end up in the Pinehurst / Southern Pines area, yes, they have an awful lot of pine trees, and I bet everyone uses the needles for mulch there :-)
~Angie

you said: But he raved about this 'pine straw' that is used there so had his girlfriend bring a truckload of bales of the stuff at Easter and he put it down today. He can't believe I'm not ecstatic.

>>>>>>>>>> my, my, my .... let me get this straight .... you got a professionally installed ... maybe free .. application of what is a unique mulch for NO IL .... and you are not thanking this child with all of your heart ... perhaps we are looking a gift horse in the mouth ....

if i had someone gratuitiously come and apply ANYTHING to my garden i would be so effusive to them .. and so generous with whatever they wanted to share from my garden that they would need another truck to haul it all away ....

i think you owe him an apology .. and perhaps the best dinner you can provide to him ....

ouch ... sorry to be so 'plain talkin' about it all ...

good luck

ken

PS: is it the gift or the 'giving' of the gift that we are to be thankful for????

Jeeez Ken.

I have several hundred pines and have tons of needles to
use as mulch.
Personally, I kinda like the look of the needle mulch,
but it's just so much easier for me to have someone fill up the truck with bark mulch to
bring home and spread down.
That's enough hard work just doing the spreading!

I do have a few hostas planted around pines with needle mulch put there naturally.
The hostas seem to be doing well with pine needles all around them.
Frankly, I don't see any difference in slug damage.
Pine needles or bark..my slugs don't care, they just
want my hostas.

I guess it's "what rocks your boat"
It's your garden, you are the one that'll have to look
at it everyday.
I didn't catch if the needles are already down yet or not.
If the needles are already down you could always lay a
thin layer of bark over it. That will save you a boat
load of money on bark mulch and you'll still have the look that you like.
I'm sure your son will understand.

Most pine straw (mulch) comes from yellow pine plantations grown for the pulpwood used in the paper industry. They are grown in wide rows large enough for hay balers to drive through and bale the straw.

The pine needles you refer to may be Pinus palustris southern long needle pine, 20 inch needles, there is another, Pitch Pine, Pinus rigida, 10 inch needles and slash pine. Sad, the former large forest range Pinus palustris was from Texas around to So. Virginia in the coastal plane has been reduced to 5% of its former range.

I would like to try it, but no one in Northern Virginia sells it. I'm even having a hard time finding someone who sells nuggets in bulk.

Isn't there something about pine straw being better because it makes the soil more... hmm, maybe more acid?... than regular shredded bark mulch?

Isn't there something about pine straw being better because it makes the soil more... hmm, maybe more acid?... than regular shredded bark mulch?
lisasmall

The University of Il did a lot of work on changing soil, they found it is almost impossible to change your basic soil. If you get a ph test and figure how much of something required to change your soil just deep enough for hosta is staggering numbers. You can make small changes but not much.

I think soil testing is a waste of time, I can go into detail if you like.

Again the soil changing comes from row cropping where you are dealing with annuals with shallow roots.

Ken - you made me laugh so hard tears ran down! I know, I know!! I'm an ingrate. He's still so excited about how 'beautiful' it looks. I'm getting used to it....and I cook him (fairly) decent meals all the time. And I HELPED him, so I'm not a total loser mother -- close.

Esther_Opal: Interesting stuff about the different pine needles - these are (I measured) between 8 and 10 inches long and curved - it's not something you can just dump and spread, either - you have to pull it apart cuz it's wound around itself. I'm going to ask his girlfriend who works for Peter Winberg Nursery and Landscaping in Cinci which supplier they use - it might be 'Evans'??? I sure hope it's not the rare one. Can't believe a commercial landscape outfit would do that.

Thanks for the opinions! It's the 'fluffiness' that is hard to get used to. It sits up so high that I had to go around and brush it off the leaves of 200 just-unfurling Hostas and he thought I was nuts. I think the color bothers me the most - I'm used to dark pine bark. But like sassy7142 says - I can always lay down a layer of whatever. And hey, the H's will grow up to cover 90% of it so what's the matter with me!

And this year I am going to post pics, finally, so we'll see how it looks in a month or so.

Westy