Don Kinzler shares his secret ingredient for mulched weed control

Did you hear about Cuba’s struggle to control weeds? It’s being called the Cuban Thistle Crisis.

Whether it’s thistles or other annoying weeds, I’ve been controlling the invaders in our landscape and perennial flower gardens with shredded wood mulch with a rather surprising material underneath.

Before I reveal the secret ingredient that increases wood mulch’s weed-fighting power, let’s take a step back in time.

When my wife, Mary, and I operated our garden center business, we also provided landscape installation. The norm in the ’70s and ’80s was rock mulch installed over a layer of black plastic.

Rock, of course, is a long-lived product, but plastic proved to be problematic. Plastic doesn’t breathe, and soil underneath easily became hard-packed, moldy-moist and devoid of oxygen. Tree