by Marianne Graff, Published in April 30,2025
Photo credit: gardeningnoob.com
Wool Recycling in Ways you Never Thought of Before
Here’s a way to use your old wool blankets, wool stuffing from something, wool sweaters and wool socks with holes in them that I bet you never thought of: fertilize your garden!
I saw this video today by Fresh Tech, “Here Is Why Australia Buries Tons of Sheep Wool Under the Dead Soil”, and it blew my mind.
Photo credit: Fresh Tech video Youtube. “Here is Why Australia is Burying Tons of Sheep Wool Under Dead Soil”
Thinking Creatively
Due to a downturn in the wool market, Australia had tonnes of excess wool. Instead of send it to a landfill, which happens with discarded clothing, they thought about what else they could do with it.
Turns out it makes great fertilizer for soul and helps stabilize and rejuvenate depleted soil and stop desertification. The wool breaks down slowly and adds many nutrients back into the soil, without adding any harmful chemicals, as well as help retain water, much like mulch. It stops snails and some insects from crawling up stems.
They buried huge amounts of wool to bring dead soil back to life. In Mongolia they have successfully buried wool in circular patches to stop the advancing desert and prepare the soil for a massive tree planting and reforestation project.
Photo credit: Fresh Tech video Youtube. “Here is Why Australia is Burying Tons of Sheep Wool Under Dead Soil”
They buried wads of it in soil, where thru found it slowly broke down naturally.
A Pellet for Your Thoughts
They made some old wool cloth into pellets, which they buried, with the same positive results.
Photo Credit: Wool Grow Australia. https://aussiewoolpellets.com.au/
They used flat pieces of wool cloth and tacked them around young trees to protect them in areas where they wanted to protect the young roots from sand and erosion and it worked better than anything else they had tried to date.
They have also created a liquid wool fertilizer!
A Cozy Blankei
I think the most surprising example of using wool leftovers was to put it down under walking trails that had eroded and turned into watery mud paths.Apparentky they got this idea from remnants of wool found under ancient Roman roads. The wool lined paths made 10 years ago have remained intact and stabilized. I am absolutely amazed by this. I think of all the wool sweaters I have owned that got holes in them, and wonder how this material that seems so delicate could fortify roads for hundreds of years.
For those reading this who only have small garden patches, take heart. This gardener (the gardeningnoob.com) tried it out in her garden in the back yard and reported she loved using wool because it:
- protected her tiny plants
- retained moisture extremely well during a drought , wool (pictured above) retained water
- fertilized the soil slowly (she reported it took a year to break down)
- brought dead soil back to life by attracting healthy biome development
- aerated the soil (providing air and water channels deep into the soil).
I admit that at first it struck me as a huge waste to bury wool and use it as compost or fertilizer. But I’ve changed my mind. Compared to filling landfills, where nothing really breaks down once buried and the soil created is so filled with chemicals it can’t be used, burying wool in an eco friendly and productive way that rugged you immediate benefit and restores the earth is not actually a waste at all.