By Kathleen Marquardt The recent Los Angeles/Palisades wildfires have sparked a heated debate, with many attributing the devastation to various factors, including climate change, political mismanagement, and environmental policies. While these fires are undeniably tragic, understanding the complex array of contributing factors behind them requires examining everything from weather patterns to urban development and resource management. Climate vs. Weather: Understanding …
By Andrew Mollenbeck Bruce Reuser built a business from dust — sawdust, to be precise. The father of four was raising his children on his own in Santa Rosa, California when the need to provide for them led to a new venture, one whose humble beginning in 1978 eventually led to the innovative landscape materials company that continues to bear …
By Kathleen Marquardt In recent years, the topic of land acquisition by major corporations, foreign governments, and private equity firms has gained increasing attention. Companies like BlackRock, JP Morgan, Vanguard, and others have been purchasing vast tracts of farmland, forests, and single-family homes, raising concerns about the long-term impact on agriculture and local communities. Additionally, foreign powers like China are …
By P.J. Heller It wasn’t that long ago when Jim Weber looked out at a section of his Ohio Mulch property and watched as trucks would get stuck in thick mud. Weber wanted to use part of a 10-acre plot for truck and equipment storage and to construct a warehouse building. The problem was the ground was too damp, soft …
By Dr. Brian E. Jackson As all aspects of horticultural crop production continue to improve and evolve, research and development of soilless substrates is also keeping pace with our ever changing and demanding production practices. Processed pine and fir bark has been the primary substrate component for nursery growers across the country for several decades, a trend that holds true …
By P.J. Heller Nine decades after “Grandpa Sol” started his business by repurposing wood waste materials, his legacy lives on. “We’re doing the same thing 90 years later that grandpa did in the ’30s,” says his grandson, Rusty Rexius. Grandpa Sol’s business – Rexius Fuel Service – initially involved going to Oregon sawmills to collect sawdust, which would normally be …
By Dr. Brian E. Jackson Once upon a time growers could call their growing media supplier(s) and have product ordered, shipped, and delivered within days. It is no mystery to anyone today that “those days” are gone, at least for the foreseeable future. The global growing media industry, like so many others in horticulture, has experienced unprecedented product demand which …
By P.J. Heller Jim Weber has come a long way since he was a 19-year-old running a lawn service business out of the garage at his parents’ home. Today, some 38 years later, Weber is owner and president of Ohio Mulch, one of the largest mulch manufacturing companies in Ohio. The company, headquartered on a 56-acre site in Columbus, has …
By Keith Barker Beau Gibney, CEO/COO at Green Vision Materials (GVM) based out of Newbury, Ohio, near Cleveland, began in the mulch and soil products business after starting his own landscaping company right out of high school, in the early nineties. Through that decade, he aggressively grew his business and found he was generating a huge amount of green waste.“I …
By Robert L. LaGasseExecutive Director Mulch & Soil Council “Do you want your children to grow up to be truck drivers?” That was the question posed by Philip Byrd, then president of the American Trucking Associations (ATA) and Bulldog Trucking, when he spoke to members of the Mulch & Soil Council about the issue of a looming truck driver shortage. …
