River Rock Vs Mulch

This landscaping gravel can be anywhere from the size of a pea up to golf ball size.

River rock vs mulch.

Read on to learn the pros and cons of mulching with an organic mulch or an inorganic mulch like rocks. You don t need to replace it every year. My step brother and i put in the landscaping with rocks instead of mulch last fall and it s been working well for us. Landscaping rock commonly referred to as river rock decorative gravel stone mulch or landscaping rock.

Mulch is the cheapest of the three material options. Since there is no replacement requirement river rock might cost more upfront but will not come with reoccurring annual costs. Rock mulch is more expensive than wood mulch. Harder to spring clean up beds.

So you may actually save money over time. Not ideal for really wet areas. I knew from experience in our past house that flower bed rocks would keep stay much better than mulch so we decided to go for it. Rock is more expensive than bark mulch.

At about three to six times the cost of organic mulches such as cypress pine bark or. Pros and cons of organic mulch pros. I had seen some river rock flower beds online and thought they looked nice. Therefore it ends up a much cheaper option in the long run.

The rock can help slow down water from eroding parts of the landscape. Mulch which is better in flower beds and around trees. Mulch also gets displaced easily by heavy rain and it isn t good on steep slopes. It sells for about 4 to 5 per bag at a big box store but keep in mind that bags of rock mulch only contain about 0 5 cubic feet of material four times less than a bag of wood mulch.

Unlike mulch you never have to replace river rock. Mulch can nearly double how fast trees and plants grow according to this study. The price of rock mulch varies depending on the type and size but generally costs two to three times more than an application of mulch. River rock is considerably more expensive than organic mulches such as shredded bark wood chips or compost.

Long lasting never needs replaced. But remember it doesn t break down and disappear into the soil like bark mulch does. Any type of decorative gravel can be used as groundcover including lava rock quartz granite pea gravel and river rock. The cost of mulch versus river rock is significant river rock being up to 3x more expensive than mulch.

Benefits of rock mulch. It s the most sustainable of the three and is not likely not to be displaced by rain. Lesser prevention of weed germination. Once it is positioned and placed it s perfectly situated for all of time.

One of the changes we made was to replace all the mulch around the patio with river rocks and possibly all the flower beds with rocks instead of mulch.