Cut tires for mulch

[Pika]

My neighbor has recently redone all his mulch with that tire-cut stuff. I think I would like to try to do that with my areas. Anybody done this yet?

 

[KennyV]

A lot of the schools especially the elementary and preschools have done that with shredded rubber... It holds up very well and does not migrate like I thought it would... good stuff... :smile:KennyV

 

[Ric]

A lot of the schools especially the elementary and preschools have done that with shredded rubber... It holds up very well and does not migrate like I thought it would... good stuff... :smile:KennyV

[FONT=Times New Roman, Georgia,Times]Rufus Chaney of the USDA Agricultural Research Service, analysing twenty years of research, concluded that the majority of research leads to the conclusion that for the Zinc factor alone, ground or chipped rubber should never be used in gardens or composts. Yet rubber remains an undisclosed ingredient in some commercially packaged composts, so that even a gardener who knows better than to dump rubber particles all over their garden may be doing so unknowingly.

A gardener needs only consider the zinc factor & the stink factor to realize this is toxic garbage unsuitable for landscaping. But there are other heavy metal & toxic contaminants in crumb rubber, including arsenic, cadmium, lead & nickel, which can effect the safety of groundwater.

Full article http://www.paghat.com/rubbermulch.html[/FONT]

 

[KennyV]

I am sure you will find it to be perfectly safe..
http://www.rubberecycle.com/:thumbsup:
http://www.rubberecycle.com/landscape.asp:thumbsup:
http://www.diamond-safety.com/Rubber Mulch Products.html:thumbsup:
100% recycled rubber, Non toxic, odorless, Not a food source for most insects or termites...
There are a lot of good things to be said about it...
I don't think anyone with a garden would want to use it for a garden mulch... not because it may be toxic, but because you never incorporate any non organic material in a garden that you are going to work up every year, if you did after 10 years the bulk of your soil would be rubber, not a lot of plant nutrient in a mostly rubber soil.
For a ground cover it is perfect, it's used like I said on school playgrounds... :smile:KennyV

 

[Giles]

I checked on the shredded tire mulch but the cost was about Two or Three time the cost of regular mulch. I don't think it was higher priced a few years ago.
Is it just in my area?

 

[Pika]

I haven't been able to get a price on it yet. I wouldn't be using it in areas where I grow food, so that wouldn't really be a consideration for me. Thanks for the information!

 

[Jetblast]

Cypress mulch is cheap and pretty good stuff. I'm too lazy to mulch every year but with Cypress I can get two or three years out of it.