Sue, that's exactly what I meant. But I guess that we should spread "stinky mulch" out somewhere and flush it where the runoff WON'T poison small plants. It's worse than I thought. I had forgotten ammonia and hydrogen sulfide.
"Chemicals produced by fermenting organisms in the mulch pile under oxygen-deficient conditions can cause significant injury on annual and perennial landscape plants. These toxic substances can include ammonia, alcohol, methanol, acetic acid or hydrogen sulfide. These chemicals often escape, or volatilize, soon after spreading the mulch."
http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/t...
The second link is especially interesting, if true:
" Sour mulch seems to be restricted to hardwood bark and not to pine bark. "
https://www.uaex.edu/publicati...
