How many bales of pine straw for a 3 ft × 60 ft foundation bed?

Sixty feet is about the length of the front of a typical single-story house, and 3 ft is a common depth for a foundation bed of small shrubs. Long, narrow beds like this are easy to underestimate because they look small, but at 180 sq ft they take about as much straw as a 13 × 14 ft island bed.

What to know about pine straw for a 3×60 foundation bed

At 180 sq ft the exact count is just over five standard bales, so the sixth bale is mostly spare. That is useful rather than wasteful: narrow beds lose straw at the edge where the mower and string trimmer throw it back onto the lawn, and the spare covers the touch-up after the first few weeks of settling.

Measure the width at several points. Foundation beds are rarely a true 3 ft all the way: they bulge around corner shrubs and steps and pinch in at the downspouts. Average the widths, or split the bed into sections, before you trust the count.

This is the one bed where pine straw sits right against the building. Pull it back from the siding so the wall stays dry and the straw is not touching wood, leave the ground under the dryer vent, the gas meter and the air-conditioning unit bare or in stone, and keep the soil under the straw sloping away from the house. In wildfire country, the usual advice is to keep all flammable mulch out of the strip nearest the walls.

Planting the bed as well? Shrubs are commonly set at least 2–3 ft out from the foundation, which is why 3 ft beds suit small shrubs; see the plant spacing calculator for how many fit. For the rest of the beds around the house, see how much pine straw for 1,000 sq ft of beds.