Hi, all! We're building a backyard play area to house an outdoor wooden gym set. We were planning on filling it with kid-safe playground mulch (which is made of engineered wood fiber chips), but I found some stories online about this stuff spotaneously combusting at a playgroud in Arlington.
Does anyone know about this or have experiences, good/bad, with this? Is there a different type of mulch that is used for playgrounds? I have heard of people also using pea gravel instead of mulch, since it has give when kids land on it.
And does anyone know of someone that will deliver a big dumptruck load of these type of materials to your house?
Thanks for your input!
Hi B.,
We used the rubber mulch that you can find at Sams. It has been great! We bought it at the store but I think you can purchase it online and have it delivered.
I checked with a couple different places and Sams had the best price.
I have heard of people using rubber mulch in these situations. It is said to be safer for the kids and environmentally friendly.
http://rubberscapes.net/
http://www.permalife.com/PermaLifeDistributors.asp
At our preschool they use the recycled rubber mulch. It takes forever to decompose and doesn't seem to blow away in the wind. I'm pretty sure you can order it by the truckload from the internet.
I've seen the rubber mulch at Sam's Club. Maybe that will work better than the other. If you want to go the pea gravel route, I know someone who does road work and can probably get you the gravel. Let me know if you want his number. Thanks!
If you look into pea gravel, make sure you price the washed pea gravel.
I recently attended a seminar on Sustainable Landscaping and tire mulch was discussed as a great resource for playgrounds. It's low maintenance, harmless and prevents injuries. They recommended it for playgrounds.
Like the others have mentioned .. I would TOTALLY get the rubber mulch - that stuff is awesome and actually fun to walk on barefoot! :-)
