Looking for the best way to use all of those falling pine needles in your garden and flowerbeds?
Just as many trees shed their leaves every fall, pine trees also drop a fair amount of their needles to the ground each and every year as they replace and replenish their own green foliage. And although they might not drop them all – you can end up with a pretty big supply of needles on the ground. But what can you really do with all of them?
When it comes to pine needles and how and where to use them in the landscape, there are often way more questions than solid answers. And it’s easy to see why. There are a lot of misconceptions and misinformation, and it certainly leads to a lot of confusion about just how valuable they are to a gardener, and where you can safely and effectively use them.
The simple truth is that pine needles can be wonderful for a whole slew of uses when it comes to gardening. Both in the vegetable garden and in flowerbeds as well. But the key to success is knowing when, where and how to use them – and more importantly, where not to!
The Best Ways To Use Pine Needles In Your Flowerbeds & Garden!
Pine Needles & Acidity
Before we get to where you can use pine needles, it’s important to cover the acidity topic. Unfortunately, pine needles get a bit of a bad reputation when it comes to being overly acidic.
Many gardeners mistakenly think you can only use needles around acid loving plants, but that is actually not the case. It really depends if you are talking about green needles, or the brown ones that have fallen to the ground.
When needles are green and on a tree, they are acidic in nature. Green pine needles will register around 3.0 to 3.5 on the PH scale while still green. If you were to use green needles around plants that prefer more alkaline soils, it would definitely negatively impact their growth – and your soil’s acidity levels.
But as pine needles age and break down, much of that acidity is lost. In fact, by the time needles die and drop to the ground, they are much, much closer to a neutral PH. And after they age even more and turn deep brown, they basically register as neutral. Which means you can use them in more places than you might have thought!
Now that we have covered the topic of acidity, let’s take a close look at how and where you can use pine needles in both flowerbeds and vegetable gardens. And why, even though dead needles are not acidic, they shouldn’t be used in all situations when growing vegetables.
Using Pine Needles In Flowerbeds
The sheer volume and availability of pine needles makes them excellent for use as a mulch. But where do they work best as a mulch?
Brown (aged) needles are great for mulching flowerbeds and around bushes or trees. Again, remember that they are near neutral in PH and will not affect the plants or the soil when it comes to acidity.
A three to four inch layer of fallen pine needles can do wonders to keep weed seeds out and flowerbeds looking fresh. The needles also break down very slowly, saving on the amount of re-mulching that will need to take place. Especially in perennial flowerbeds that are not worked as often.
For perennials and bushes that love more acidic soil, you can mulch with fresher needles. Azaleas, rhododendrons, blueberry bushes and even strawberry plants prefer slightly acidic soil. To help these plants, mulch around them with green needles or freshly fallen pine needles.
The green needles will provide the most acidity for plants, but even freshly fallen needles will give a small dose of acid to plants as it leaches out, helping them in the process.
Using Pine Needles In A Vegetable Garden
The good news is that you can use brown needles anywhere in a garden as a mulch without worry of acidity. A thick layer of pine needles is an excellent way to mulch between your rows. This helps to keep weeds down, eliminates having to till or work the soil, and keeps rows from getting muddy and messy from excess rainfall.
But where pine needles can really be excellent as a mulch is underneath sprawling, vining crops. Leaving soil bare under melon, cucumber, squash, zucchini and other vining vegetables can lead to disaster for the plant’s fruit.
When ripening fruit touches the soil, the moisture can often cause rot or soft spots that damage and even ruin the fruit in some cases. But by putting a few inches of pine mulch underneath the vines, they keep the fruit from touching bare dirt.
Although you can use straw or grass clippings for this, they often hold moisture in. This, of course can also cause the fruit to stay wet and rot.
Pine needles, however, are thin and don’t hold water. That means they dry quicker and still provide good air flow. They also have the added benefit of not being attractive to insects. Three more reasons they are perfect for helping vining fruits ripen as a mulch!
More Ways To Use Pine Needles In A Vegetable Garden
To use around vining crops, simply lay a few inches of needles on the ground all around the plants. All that is left is to let the vines grow over them. The thick layer of needles will also help to keep competing weeds from coming up around the vines, serving one more useful purpose.
Pine needles can also be used around ground and root crops such as onions and garlic. They are also great for protecting ripening strawberries from touching the ground. Again, there is no worry of aged needles changing the pH of the soil around these crops.
Last but not least, pine needles are great for covering raised bed soil in the winter. A thick three to four inch covering is perfect for keeping weed seeds out. Even better, it also helps to protect the soil from erosion from winter winds, snow and ice.
Vegetable Plants To Avoid With Pine Mulch – The Best Way To Use Pine Needles In A Vegetable Garden
There are some vegetable plants that pine needles are not good for mulching with. It’s not that the needles will hurt them, they just won’t help as much as other organic mulches will in their place. Tomato and pepper plants are two of the biggest to not mulch with pine needles.
Pine needles are thin and narrow. Because of that, they are poor insulators of the soil. They also don’t hold in moisture well either. Even worse, they can mat together over time, keeping water and nutrients from getting to the roots if too thick.
Most importantly, because they break down slowly, needles don’t add organic material to the soil in quick fashion. Straw, grass clippings, and compost all do much a better job of adding more organic nutrients for high nutrient plants such as tomatoes and peppers.
Composting Pine Needles – The Best Ways To Use Pine Needles In Your Garden & Flowerbeds
So what about using all of those falling needles in your compost pile? The short answer is that it’s best to leave needles out of a home compost pile. Again, it’s not due to any acidity issues at all. Once fully composted, pine needles are not acidic in the least.
The reason you should not use pine needles is that they are extremely slow to decompose. Pine needles have a waxy outer coating that takes considerably longer to break down than most other organic materials.
Because of that, it can take tremendously longer to create finished fresh compost. Even when you chop them up prior to adding.
When it comes to pine needles, you are better off to create a dedicated pile of needles. They will break down slowly, but you can then have them at the ready to use anywhere and everywhere you need them.
Here is to taking advantage of all of those falling pine needles this year, and using them to help power and protect your vegetable garden this year! And if you have falling pine cones too – here’s a great read as well: How To Make Scented Pine Cones – Turn Ordinary Pine Cones Into Holiday Magic!
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This Is My Garden is a garden website created by gardeners, for gardeners. Jim and Mary Competti have been writing gardening, DIY and recipe articles and books and speaking for over 15 years from their 46 acre Ohio farm. They publish three articles every week, 52 weeks a year. Sign up today to follow via email, or follow along!