How to Use Recycled Newspapers in the Garden

Newspapers can stack up quickly. You can donate them to paper recyclers or you can recycle them yourself. The garden is a perfect place to get double-duty from your newspapers. Here are some suggestions.

Newspaper inks aren't the heavy petroleum-based problem they used to be, but be warned that there is still some petroleum being used in printing ink along with canola oil. As a result, you may want to go lighter on the use of recycled newspapers in the vegetable garden. This one is still up for debate since most authorities think there is no reason to be concerned. Your choice. Here are a number of ways you can recycle those newspapers -- in the edible garden or elsewhere in the landscape.

Use a thick covering of newspapers to kill of weeds and lawn you want to remove. Cutting off light and much of the air with newspaper is a good alternative to herbicides. If you want the area to look better during the process, hide the newspapers with a layer of mulch.

Continuing on with the mulch idea, use a moist layer of newspapers -- maybe three to four pages thick around garden plants. This will keep the soil warmer in the cool weather and cooler in the warm. It will also slow down evaporation so you need to water less. Cover the newspaper with a layer of soil or mulch. In time, the newspaper will break down and return to the soil leaving no trace behind.

Add newspaper to your compost heap. Don't layer it or it will form a matted barrier. Mix it in with other materials like kitchen and garden plant waste. Newspaper will help improve the texture of the compost, though it won't add much in the way of nutrients. A little extra nitrogen is a good idea when using newspaper -- or nitrogen fixing plant waste from beans, nettles, peas or other nitrogen-fixing plants will work well, too.

Make pots for seedlings out of several layers of newspaper or line the bottom of a pot with a few sheets to keep soil from dribbling out of the drainage holes.