Thanks. The mulch around the onions is a mixture of straw, wood chips and dried comfrey and it was a couple inches thick when I first put it down but as you can see from the picks it has been absorbed into the soil quite a bit, it helps with weeds, moisture retention and fertility of the soil. The stones you see in some of the pics are the gravel pathways alongside one of my gardens and the vines are coming out into the walkway but I don't mind, I just train them along the sides so the aren't in my way.