This is how I store grass clippings for later use.

If you are anything like me and think that grass clippings are one of the best things in the world, you might want to save some for later. You might after all not be able to use it all at once. But how to store grass clippings then?

If you just put it in a pile somewhere, you will notice that the clippings become difficult to work with really quickly. First of all, the grass gets really warm when it starts to decompose. And when it's been lying around a few days, the clippings form thick clumps that are difficult to put around the plants.

But there is a way to get around this problem so that you can store your grass clippings for a really long time. I have been able to successfully store grass clippings over the winter and then used the grass in early spring the following year.

Read more about mulch: Mulching my polytunnels

Storing grass clippings

1. Pack the grass clippings in bags. Use big bags, you can buy them at the hardware store. You can, of course, fit a lot of grass in these bags, and they are made from thick plastic. It's important that the bag is whole and undamaged when you use it.

2. Fill up a bag, almost to the top. Lift it up and drop it in the ground a few times so that the grass compresses in the bag.

3. Push as much air out of the bag as possible. The easiest way to do this is by putting your knees and arms around the opening of the bag and then pushing the air out.

4. Close the bag (you don't need to tie it, just spin the bag a few times so the opening is sealed.) After that, turn the bag upside down. Put the bags in a spot that's convenient for you. I leave my bags close to my beds so that I can use them whenever I want.

This is what the grass clippings look like after around a week. It's nice and moist, airy and smells fresh. Storing grass clippings like this will make it more or less like silage in the bag, the perfect mulch.

Storing grass clippings like this is really convenient since I can just cover the beds whenever I want. I planted the delicious pointed cabbage Filderkraut here and then I covered it with grass clippings that I stored for around a week. I will harvest my pointed cabbage in fall. The soil is moist and nutritious underneath the mulch, which is extra important now that it's getting hot and dry outside.

More about mulch from Sara's Kitchen Garden on Youtube:

/Sara Bäckmo