Free Mulch in Austin!

I have two sources of free mulch in Austin.

1. Austin Resource Recovery

When I have some extra cardboard boxes and I'm heading to south Austin, I'll stop off at the recycling center and pick up some mulch. You fill your own boxes, so bring gloves and/or a shovel. It's fun. The quality is extremely variable. This is shredding from yard waste, so you could get some really nice shredded hardwood, or they might only have some garbage infused unknown plant shreddings.

The path to my front door uses nice mulch I got for free at Austin Resource Recovery

2. Leaves

This is my primary source for veggie patch mulch and for leaves to go into my compost. There are some beautiful trees on my street, and my neighbors don't mind me taking the leaves.

Across the street tree

I collect the leaves in fall, and I store them in my leave storage silo (along with other stuff like paper bags and newspaper).

Leave storage silo

Then I use the leaves as a mulch in my veggie patch. This will help with soil moisture retention and soil temperature moderation.

Leaves as mulch in my veggie patch.

Why buy mulch? Maybe you need some beautiful looking mulch in large quantities, and that's a good reason to buy mulch. But if you are just using mulch for small areas or for the veggie patch, then look to free, local sources. I especially like my leaf mulch because I'm trying to reduce my carbon emissions, and the leaf mulch used zero gasoline to get into my garden.