What is mechanical mulching?

The key difference between mulching and other clearing methods is what happens to the material. A mulcher does not cut vegetation and leave it for someone else to deal with, and it does not push it into heaps. It processes the whole plant, stems included, into fine material that falls where the plant was standing.

That layer then does useful work. It sits over the soil surface and reduces the light reaching the ground, which slows the germination of whatever is in the seed bank. It protects the soil surface from rain impact and erosion, which matters on the steep and recently cleared faces where clearing usually happens. And it breaks down over time, returning organic matter and nutrient to the soil rather than sending it up in smoke.

For land clearing specifically, mulching is what lets a hillside be reclaimed in a day. There is no cutting crew, no heaping, no burn permit and no truck movements. The machine works through the standing vegetation and the site is left as ground with a layer on it.

GRazer mulch material up to 200mm to 300mm, which covers mature gorse, established woody weeds and small trees. That capacity is well above what most slope mulching equipment in New Zealand is set up for, and it is usually the thing that decides whether a neglected site can be dealt with in one operation.