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Post by daylilydude on Dec 10, 2017 6:37:36 GMT -5
The school that I work for had some hay bales in their fall decorations and ask me if I wanted them, well y'all know me... I loaded the 9 square bales up and brought them home. My question is how long would you have to leave them out in the cold to kill all the seed in it? Now i'm not using this in a in-ground garden, I have some rose bushes and other type shrubs/plants that I want to use the hay as mulch but I just don't want to have to get in around that dadblame thorny rosebush to pull weeds... lol! Your thoughts?
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Post by brownrexx on Dec 10, 2017 9:24:40 GMT -5
I think that you probably have STRAW bales not hay which is primarily used for animal feed and is full of seeds.
Straw is mostly used for animal bedding and decorations because it is made up of the left over stems of wheat, barley or rye after the main crop is harvested. It will have some seeds but not nearly as many as hay bales will have.
Leaving the bales sit outside will not kill the seeds. I use straw for mulch every year and I get some seedlings growing from it but they are super easy to pull up and there are not than many of them. Wheat seedlings are tall and skinny and easy to pull.
I love straw as a mulch and I usually get some free bales after Halloween but this year no one had any and I had to actually BUY some for the first time.
I am very jealous of your 9 bales. If you don't use all 9, just stack them out of the way someplace and they will still be good when gardening season starts and you can use them for mulch in the garden or even compost them.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Dec 10, 2017 9:42:19 GMT -5
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Post by paulf on Dec 10, 2017 9:48:54 GMT -5
Straw is a major component of the mulching program in my garden along with thick layers of newsprint. But first they play an important role as insulation along the foundation of the house during the winter months. They stop the cold winds from freezing water pipes in our kitchen. In the spring they are ready to be spread out as garden mulch.
If it is actually straw, they would make great mulch for your roses. Like Brownrexx said, the seeds will not be killed by the cold...and Mississippi does not really get cold enough to kill any weed seeds. If they are hay bales, they would still make good mulch but you may have to move the mulch around every once in a while to get rid of the weeds.
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Post by brownrexx on Dec 10, 2017 9:51:30 GMT -5
Laura_in_FL, straw bale gardening is very popular in certain places and that is a perfect picture to show daylilydude, the type of "weeds" that will grow from the bales. Just look along the left hand side of the photo and you will see the grassy seedlings of the wheat. If you let them get taller, they are really easy to pull out. BTY no one would plant a straw bale with that many tomato plants. Wouldn't it be a little crowded when they got big? also since straw bales have almost no nutrients, you would have to apply ferts to keep them fed. It's not for me. Too much work.
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Post by aqua on Dec 10, 2017 10:36:33 GMT -5
I brought home a straw bale from an autumn festival once. I guess there was a spider in it. I was driving, spider came to visit. I freaked out. So then I pulled over and was twisting and screaming and doing the hootchie-cootchie dance outside of my old saturn wagon. A police officer pulled over, too. He was not happy.
We had a "conversation" which ended with him telling me to get my car fumigated.
So I don't mess with straw bales anymore.
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Post by Gianna on Dec 10, 2017 10:44:40 GMT -5
My question is how long would you have to leave them out in the cold to kill all the seed in it? As others have said, the cold won't kill any seeds. Cold prolongs viability and why many store their seeds in the frig or freezer. ![:)](//storage.proboards.com/3247375/images/AgR8NN4iidU1wy_OcyQm.png)
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Post by paquebot on Dec 10, 2017 12:45:11 GMT -5
What seeds? Against what many people think, there's more chance of weeds in straw than hay. If hay is cut when plants are fully mature and setting seeds, there's little food value left in the plants. A late first-cutting may have some grass seed if there's quack in the field. Second and third cuttings generally have almost a zero chance of weeds. Where hay gets a bad rap is cheap horse hay. That's usually a late first cutting of something that nothing else will eat other than goats. Then the horse manure gets a bad rap for being full of weed seeds. Nothing in the horse creates them so it's a case of garbage in, garbage out. I've shredded hay bales for mulch with zero weed problems.
On the other hand, composted stable manure can be full of weeds even if the animals are fed nothing but the best pellets. The weeds come from the straw bedding. There is no weed control for grain fields so any weed growing there is able to reach full maturity by the time it's cut. What appears to be a clean bale of straw may be loaded with bare stems and seed heads or pods and you won't see them. Last year I was involved in obtaining horse manure for myself and other gardeners. (The curse or blessing of having a pickup truck.) Zero weeds in two of them. One uses sand and the other sawdust. Some friends found a good source and borrowed my truck. Old pile and had to pull the giant lamb's quarters plants from last year before they could get at the manure. None of that came even close to my gardens. Truck bed swept clean to be certain.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by ladymarmalade on Dec 10, 2017 14:26:24 GMT -5
I was going to suggest the same thing! Waste not, want not!
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Post by ladymarmalade on Dec 10, 2017 14:31:12 GMT -5
BTY no one would plant a straw bale with that many tomato plants. Wouldn't it be a little crowded when they got big? also since straw bales have almost no nutrients, you would have to apply ferts to keep them fed. It's not for me. Too much work. In the article it mentions that those are dwarf tomatoes, so you could get away with planting so many as they don't grow large and sprawl like conventional tomatoes. But even so, there are people straw bale gardening with all kinds of fruits and veggies! strawbalegardens.com/pictures
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Post by brownrexx on Dec 10, 2017 14:43:39 GMT -5
ladymarmalade , I guess that I am guilty of not readying the article! I grow only full sized, indeterminate plants planted in the ground inside of 5'tall tomato cages in my garden. I have actually never even seen a dwarf tomato plant so I guess that I learned something new here today and I never realized that people grew so many different things in straw. Those pictures were interesting. Thanks.
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Post by ladymarmalade on Dec 10, 2017 14:48:24 GMT -5
ladymarmalade, I guess that I am guilty of not readying the article! I grow only full sized, indeterminate plants planted in the ground inside of 5'tall tomato cages in my garden. I have actually never even seen a dwarf tomato plant so I guess that I learned something new here today. Me too! Meaning, pretty much only full sized indeterminate tomatoes. Though, this year I have committed to growing a dwarf, so we'll see. My previous experiences with them are less than stellar. Dwarf tomatoes are ideal for pot and container growing. www.craiglehoullier.com/dwarf-tomato-breeding-project/
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Post by brownrexx on Dec 10, 2017 14:52:47 GMT -5
ladymarmalade, Looks interesting. It's always fun to try something new. My new thing this year is trying to overwinter artichokes. I grew them from seedlings in 2017 and the flavor was fabulous. I have them covered with about a foot of straw and a tarp. I am hoping that my 3 plants make it through my PA winter. This is the method described by an artichoke grower in Michigan and he should know about winter there!
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Post by bestofour on Dec 10, 2017 17:11:08 GMT -5
I plant squash in STRAW bales every year and once in a while have a little grassy growth but not enough to bother anything. I’ve been told to never use HAY because it will seed out and be a gigantic mess. People talking from experience.
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Post by meandtk on Dec 10, 2017 17:11:08 GMT -5
I am assuming that N MS is as S MS is and daylilydude has hay. If you are worried about the seeds, I'd use it in the garden rather than flower beds. I don't think it would be much trouble either way, however.
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Post by paulf on Dec 10, 2017 17:53:03 GMT -5
My straw does not have weeds but some years I get wheat since that is what the plant was. Around here hay grows any number of things...whatever the seeds are from the plant; alfalfa is the only one I know but there are several different varieties.
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Post by guruofgardens on Dec 10, 2017 20:40:20 GMT -5
We bought 3 bales of straw to hopefully curb most of the cracks in the garden that seem to appear after a rain, and then many days of dry. We always mulch with lots of leaves, but our dry climate can be challenging.
So we're hoping to keep most of the cracks in the soil away from the tomato plants, at least.
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Post by paquebot on Dec 10, 2017 22:25:29 GMT -5
My straw does not have weeds but some years I get wheat since that is what the plant was. Around here hay grows any number of things...whatever the seeds are from the plant; alfalfa is the only one I know but there are several different varieties. The truth is more important than the facts. (Farm background here and former FFA member.) Alfalfa is cut just as it starts blooming. You'll never find that seed in your hay. When we grew it for seed, it was long after the oats had been combined. Hated changing the screens! By then, plants were almost dead and zero value as forage or hay. Martin
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Post by paulf on Dec 10, 2017 23:02:42 GMT -5
(Farm background here and former FFA member.) Alfalfa is cut just as it starts blooming. You'll never find that seed in your hay. When we grew it for seed, it was long after the oats had been combined. Hated changing the screens! By then, plants were almost dead and zero value as forage or hay. Thanks. All I ever did was pick up hay bales as a summer job. No idea how they grew. We hayed all morning, ate a huge meal provided by the farmer's wife, hayed some more until it got too hot, then went back into town to the swimming pool to cool off. What happened to the hay I have no idea. I thought it was used for forage. The small bales went by the wayside as the huge round bales made by baling machines got popular. There are a few more small bales showing up again.
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Post by september on Dec 11, 2017 0:45:38 GMT -5
I can't get small bales anymore, dairy farms are going out of business up here, and all the beef farmers only do big round bales.
I have to disagree a bit with Martin, in that not all hay bales are pure alfalfa. The hay in our area is usually a mix of grass types with some alfalfa, and the fields also are not kept weed free. Some farmers due to laziness or bad luck do not get their hay harvested in a timely manner and it's not unusual to find weed seeds in it. Good quality pure alfalfa hay is more expensive to produce and is used as premium feed for dairy cows. It's not too likely that it would find it's way to being sold for mulch unless it was spoiled. More likely that hay sold for garden mulch will be of the grassy lower quality type with weeds.
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Post by paquebot on Dec 11, 2017 0:51:23 GMT -5
I've got several conventional bales of clean wheat straw on hand and can get more if needed. Where I've gardened the past two years also had about 8 acres of pumpkins. Straw bales and corn bundles were also sold. The only non-grain put up was quack in the waterways and before it set seed. I shredded one bale for mixing with straw for mulching garlic. Not a single blade of green grass appeared. May have been a different story if that was cut for hay rather than to keep the height of the grass down.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by paquebot on Dec 11, 2017 1:01:49 GMT -5
I can't get small bales anymore, dairy farms are going out of business up here, and all the beef farmers only do big round bales. I have to disagree a bit with Martin, in that not all hay bales are pure alfalfa. The hay in our area is usually a mix of grass types with some alfalfa, and the fields also are not kept weed free. Some farmers due to laziness or bad luck do not get their hay harvested in a timely manner and it's not unusual to find weed seeds in it. Good quality pure alfalfa hay is more expensive to produce and is used as premium feed for dairy cows. It's not too likely that it would find it's way to being sold for mulch unless it was spoiled. More likely that hay sold for garden mulch will be of the grassy lower quality type with weeds. Since alfalfa bales were specifically mentioned, my reply only applied to that type. Mixes with timothy, red clover, canary grass, sweet clover, vetch or anything else would have elicited a different response applicable to the type of grass or legume. And for what it's worth, only first cutting of alfalfa has much chance of having any weed seeds. Second and third cuttings are almost 100% alfalfa and that's the premium stuff. Martin The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by brownrexx on Dec 11, 2017 8:43:37 GMT -5
It is harder to find straw bales around here as well. Farmers are using those big round ones. I really needed straw this year so hubby asked an Amish farmer to sell him some from one of those big round bales and he sold him 1/2 of one which he brought home loose in the back of his pick up truck. It was more work but the straw was cut shorter and it was really easy to use. The farmer charged him $12 for it which was a great price I thought. Small bales are usually $5 each.
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Post by paquebot on Dec 11, 2017 10:07:18 GMT -5
Someone around here is making mini straw bales just for decoration and small gardens. Barely 2' long and a foot wide. Trouble is that they cost about the same as a pop-up size. A plus is that all that I've seen have been very clean.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Dec 11, 2017 11:55:11 GMT -5
Those little ones for decoration are about all I see around here. I probably need to drive to one of the old-fashioned feed & seed places an hour inland to find the real stuff.
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