Will it Really Blow Away?

I love bark mulch, maybe you have noticed. Many people when I try to tell them the benefits of bark mulch tell me that it will just blow away. I know it has happened and not all mulch is created equal. But a good shredded mulch with lots of fibers will have a greater staying power than the standard large chip or fine shreds. So here are two yards, that it didn't blow away.

This is a clients yard where everything went wrong. He custom chose his mulch for optimum look and benefit. There were huge winds that blew silt from the neighboring field into his yard. The mulch didn't move, but in some places the mulch was buried in several inches of silt. It's not what anyone wants to happen to their yard, but I was pretty impressed that with that much wind and movement, the bark didn't move.

This is my test patch. These are larger mulch chunks than I would like, but this is cheap mulch via a rented shredded from taking down our Willow Tree. So, this is about as un-fancy as you can get when it comes to mulch. We have had some wild winds this year (so glad the Willow Tree is gone). We had one storm that nearly took out our shed with falling branches (just damaged the fence). But the mulch hasn't moved, not even the pile of mulch that is still sitting in the back and hasn't made it around the plants. We regularly have dirt blowing out of the garden, enough that I don't want to till the garden because it just blows away. But the bark isn't moving. The only things that have moved the bark are paws/feet and the water (you can see the little trail the heavy rains created). I figure that this area should be the windiest part of my yard and even the open pile hasn't moved in the wind.

While I can't guarantee that it will stay in your yard, I'm going to keep putting it back in my yard and recommending it. Its great for the plants, the soil, and water conservation. This area was the last spot in the yard to dry out. There really is nothing like a good shredded mulch for weed control and plant health.