Pine straw question
 

If I'm not working on cars these days I am raking and harvesting pine straw. I'm gathering it and laying it out on the pathway in the blueberry patch. My question is that there seems to be a lot more pine straw falling this year than years past. Does anyone know why some years there is more than other years? There are some trees that I have raked it under at least three times and it is time to rake it again. If pine straw was dollar bills I'd be a multi billionaire:).

Oh yea, pine straw is big business in JawJa.

OK, what is pine straw?

Pine needles that fall on the ground. Typically dry and some what brittle. Can be raked up into piles that resemble small hay piles.

I await an answer as well...
I have a number of large pines, and it seems like this year all the needles fell early, and not in excessive quantity.
Last year, multiple rakings and lawn sweepings... all the way up to winter.

Gotta be an Old Farmers Almanac kind of explanation somewhere...;)

Who buys pine straw and what do they do with it?

China. $300 a ton right now.

Pinestraw harvesting removes nutrients from the system and removes microinvertebrate habitat disrupting the nutrient cycle and the food chain for vertebrates dependent on microinverts. Typically harvesting operations do not return nutrients to the soil, unlike farmers. Also large operations do not retain any refugia for dependent species.

Not a big deal if small landowners do it. It IS a big deal when forestry get into it on an industrial scale.

Don't get me started on cypress mulch.

I figured there would be ppl that would not know what pine straw is. It falls off of the pine tree and is used for mulch around shrubbery. I lived in WV for a period of time and hauled a few bales up there to put around the shrubbery. All the neighbors asked what it was and where it came from. It goes for $3/bale around here with a bale being the same size as what we call a square hay bale. A lot of the pine straw harvested from around here goes to the Atlanta area for landscaping purposes.

I think the amount that falls has something to do with rain and when it occurs during the summer. During June/July or so we had some really heavy rain for a week or two and then have not had much since that time. I feel that is the reason there is so much on the ground now. I try to keep it raked off of the centipede grass because it will kill it if left to lay there.

I'll try to get a pic of it posted tomorrow.

Oh yea, pine straw burns real well so I guess it could be used for heating. The volumn of a ton of pine straw would be substantial.

My cabin is surrounded by Pin Oak and some years we get loads of leaves and acorns....usually with a lot of rain and warm weather. This year was a bit lower than normal in NW Pennsylvania .

Why aren't they just called pine needles?

They are pine needles when they are still on the tree:). Becomes pine straw after it has been raked up into a pile.

Hell, why not call them what they are, leaves? Or more accurately a leaf fascicle.

If they are from the common pine I have remembered seeing in the south the needles are like 8" long, so calling it straw makes some sense. Around here some needles are like 1" long so not very strawlike.

"leaf fascicle". Indeed. That trips off the tongue so well.

Serious questions. What is the pH of pine straw? What crops would benefit, and what crops might be harmed by its use?