I read a lot about wood chips... and am trying to improve my soil here. I started my fig crazyness last year and all my 'surviving' trees were in pots.  Well, I don't have money to buy potting soil, perlite, etc... I tried following what most of you recommend, but it is impossible for me, unless I'd had a real paying job...meanwhile, my wood chips sat behind my shed for a year and was showing worm activity and starting to break down.

Last fall, to each upgrade transplanting pot, I put about 1 to 3 inches of chips at the bottom, mixed some with my ground soil, compost and other breaking down matter...

For the winter, I burried the pots in a garden bed  that had hoops, I put a plastic cover but did not close the ends entirely, except for the south side, to prevent cold wind, but the North side I left it open = ocasionally i opened the thing, watered the pots, put leaves over and secured the plastic.

Now our weather seems to be improving (except it is raining cats and dogs for a few days), but I had a break to inspect each of my figlets.  I am impressed.

I did not loose any. Even the 'iffy' varieties' (Panachee, Conadria, Orphan, and others) I repotted all to bigger containers and could not believe the amount of healthy coiling roots on the wood chip portion of the soil.  On upgrading, I added more chips to the bottom. Many are ready to be planted in the ground and I plan on doing that, soon we have a break of the weather.

To make it even better, I got a full truck load of wood chips, and am in process of bringing the chips into my yard and out of the main street- those will be used by next year.

I am sold on the wood chips.

Grasa
I have been using one or two years old wood chips (30% to 50%) mixed with commercial potting mix and compost with no ill effects at all for the potted plants. It saves me on the commercial soil.

What about fresh wood chips. I just cut down a hackberry tree. Can I use that in my putting mix?

I have a spreader-truck sized load of pine shavings that never saw a horse stall.  Tarp blew off and wet the whole lot before I could put it to use.  Anyone have experience with the pine shavings (finer than chips)?

I just put the wood chips on the top of pots versus on bottom. I also throw the everywhere else in the garden. Lots of worm activity and everything thrives. I wouldn't put the chips in the bottom of pots because I heard it robs the nitrogen but figs are so vigorous they overcome it. When I put the pots on top of a layer of mulch, it was even better, it was even better. I discovered roots outgrowing the containers and forming a web of roots in the wood chips under the pot. It was easy to cut the roots at the end of the season.

I used pine bark chips last year and found my plants needed a whole lot more fertilizer than I was used to.  With hardwood chips it will need even more as they break down faster.  Although after a year it might need less.

Grasa, you can't do much better than woodchips. Try some mushrooms to help break them down and provide to extra food. http://milkwood.net/2013/07/10/making-a-wood-chip-mushroom-garden/

Seattle is the perfect place for fungi, wet, wet, wet, that is why mold here is so  easy to spread where we don't want them. Lots of shroom hunters also. Not sure I can grow the healthy ones.

"...do not use uncomposted wood products as a soil amendment..." http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/garden/07235.html I did a lot of research on this last spring when I was pulling up a 50 year old patio and making the soil ready for a garden. There is a lot of information on " soil amendments" and what to use. I had several yards of compost brought in from our boroughs recycling yard.

The use of wood chips in potting soil (Where I Live) will result in a pot of termites.

Ive had some of the same negative results with wood chips. Bark is a ole different subject as it breaks down slower but still ties up N2 as it breaks down. Wood chips on the other hand do require some aging before use. A few years back I bought 2 yards of nursery flower bed/vegetable mix and there were alot of wood chips in it. I would guess around 40-50%. My first year with vegetables was a failure due to not adding enough N2 when fertilizing. The following 2 years were off the charts with production after the wood aged and released all that tied up N2 in to the soil. One note I observed with a yard of pine bark mulch that sat in my yard for about 1 month, when I got around to finally moving it to all my beds the amount of worms on the bottom of the pine bark mulch pile was hard to believe! Must have been a couple hundred of them in 6x6 radius at the very bottom of the pile. My boys had a blast collecting as many as possible and we put a hurtin on the local bream population in our neighbor hood pond ;)

Think of chips like manure, It needs to break down before use. When chips break down they act more like compost. Many towns let you take compost for free from your town transfer station or local dump, that would be better. I can buy compost for about $20 per yard (wood chips/ mulch $17). I use partially decomposed mulch (naturally dark brown) in landscaping top dressing all the time. It suppresses weeds and holds moisture. I top dress my larger pots with mulch. I suppose you could make a good potting mix with good topsoil mixed with compost , but I would want some pearlite in the mix as well. Fertile and lime as needed.

Raw chips mixed IN the soil mix is a bad idea.  Raw chips ON the surface of the soil is a great idea.  

On top is key to keep below the chips nice and moist.
If you mix it in, it will start robbing the soil. Think of it as a barrier or top cover to keep good things in the soil.

Based on my experience. Adding any type of wood into or even below soil is an invitation for fungus.
The more it breaks down the more moisture it will hold. If it's the kind of thing you change every year
you can probably get away with it and it may even be beneficial. Over the long term it may cause
you headaches.

thanks for sharing this valuable info Grasa. I have a lot of wood chips form our tree trimming from last December, I was thinking of using it as a ground cover which I have done for my new terrace beds but there is a lot more left and they are getting dark in color, maybe I can use them for soil mix too? how long do I have to wait till they are ready for planting and not cover?

Grasa,
Thanks for sharing your results.
Composted wood chips is a standard ingredient in many commercial potting mixes.
Fresh wood chips should be composted or used as a mulch on top of garden soils. The fresh wood chip mulch will breakdown "compost" on the top of the soil due to soil microbes and will also support a healthy earthworm population. I also have Pine Shavings as mulch on the soil surface with very good results.
To speed the decomposition I add Espoma-Tone fertilizers (with Mycorrhizae) to "seed" the soil surface before placing the mulch.

Hypothetically speaking... lol.... if someone ran out of their mix and got the bright idea to use fresh pine shavings (bedding) in the mix to get the last few plants potted up in 4 gallon pots last June...... short of repotting with new mix could one just add some extra Nitrogen to the fertilizing this summer to compensate for the lack of it due to the shavings?? And would those shavings take very long to decompose as they are quite thin to begin with?

Bedding frequently contains antimicrobials to prevent break down. I still have them in one garden bed after 4 years from a batch of horse manure. If they do break down, you might get a big N boost at the wrong time. I'd repot if they are still present this spring.

+1 for what WillsC said.

Grasa, to your point, you are going to have fungi anyway, why not try some you might want to eat ;)