About garden aisles

[rence]

The paths between my garden boxes (and even my boxes themselves) are overrun with weeds and grass.

I'll tell you what I did and you can tell me how to fix it

When I first created my garden, I started out with raised beds (4x4 garden boxes) laied over really short grass. I put two layers of weed cloth on the bottom of the boxes. The first harvest was my very bestest harvest ;D but the chickens and guineas took a bite out of everything.

So my brother enclosed my garden (and I added another row of garden boxes), so it's all closed off to the chickens, guineas, raccoons, rabbits, etc. Of course, the bugs ate everything last year.....

But my real big problem is the grass and weeds in the aisles (and even in the boxes. The aisles are covered with two layers of weed cloth, and then about 2 inches of wood chips was added on top of that.

But last year, my garden was overrun with weeds and grass because I caught it in time. But this spring, I was studying for finals when 15+ inches of rain was dumped on us, and everything grew about 2 feet.

I'm having someone help me clear back the jungle that used to be my garden. So far, half of the aisles and garden boxes have been weed-eaten down. And we'll get to the other half on monday. Questions:

1) how do I keep it from coming back again?
2) Do I keep all that broken down weed-eaten foliage on the aisles or do I get rid of it?
3) whether or not I get rid of the broken down grass and weeds, I'd like to cover it with a few inches of something that might hinder growth, maybe pea gravel?
4) should I take my little mantis tiller and till the 4x4 garden boxes, or hand weed? someone said that if I till it, the weeds that were laying dormant in the dark will grow.

5) how do I finally get control of my garden again?
This is awful....

[Janene]

When I get overwhelmed with the grass and weeds.....I get the push mower out! I mow what I can in between the rows then start in with a tiller or lay cardboard down.
I do my best to hand weed where the plants are, tedious I know!
Janene

[rence]

But I have all that weed cloth and wood chips underneath all that grass and weeds. Won't it all get caught up and ruin the mower blades?

Can I just light it all on fire and start from scratch?

[petey]

perhaps this might help you! its all household stuff
tipnut.com/weed-killers/

[rence]

Oooh, I like the vinegar and salt combo. I've been trying to read about this too. Some places swear by newspaper and cardboard. Maybe I can try spraying all the aisles with half vinegar and half salt, and then cover with newspaper, and try the wood chips or pea gravel again.... thank you for the link

[epitts75]

We did the weed cloth and wod chips exactly as you described three years ago. The result was exactly the same. That weed mat stuff doesnt work at all! And we spent a fortune between it and all the wood mulch we bought to cover it. This year, since we had moved anyway and needed to remake the garden, we used carboard boxes underneath the garden beds. I built the raised beds out of cedar and used the cardboard extending out a couple inches from the beds. For the time being we have left the grass surrounding them...I built them far apart enough to mow. In the future we may use more cardboard topped with mulch between the beds/ We've had no weeds yet. I don't know if it would be worth picking up your boxes and redoing the soil with the cardboard underneath, but I bet it would work. You can also use thick layers of newspaper.

[Jenn]

I pull the weeds and use them as mulch.
-Jenn

[catherine]

Old, disgusting, no-one-wants-it, they'll-just-about-pay-you-to-haul-it-away CARPET is my solution! We happened to be pulling out some of that nasty cheapo '70's contractor grade mustard, orange and avocado stuff, and it is making AWESOME weed block! I understand that you can sometimes get it from carpet places when they replace carpeting. Talk to your local carpet store? I've piled an inch or two of mulch over the top of what I've laid in my aisles, just for looks...and it looks great! The only weeds that are coming through are at the edges! ;D

[Shawn]

We tried the black weed fabric stuff, too. The crabgrass loved it. The garden center guy asked me where I got it and said if it came from Walmart, it's too thin. "If you can see through it, so can your weeds." So I bought his, it's thicker and way harder to cut.
You could also double or triple up your poorer quality weed mat.
Or the best thing (besides the carpet already mentioned) is black plastic. It will sprout and smother all the weed seeds on the top layer.
We had our weeds pretty well under control this way in our garden and then we laid down wood chips real thick.
I will say DO NOT TILL, this does just stir up more weed seeds and there's something like a million of them per square foot or something... not exaggerating, either.
I hope something in this helps. I know how frustrating it is to get behind the 8 ball on weeding. I almost gave up gardening one year and then I read about "weedless gardening" by Lee Reich in Mother Earth and got his book from the library and I've been a much happier gardener ever since.

[rence]

the black plastic sounds a lot more economical than the newspaper-collecting, and we don't get too many cardboard boxes anymore. Well, I have a few more days to think about what to do, since we're finishing the weed-eating on monday.

I wonder if plastic will help in the boxes themselves. And I think I'm definitely going to cover each of the boxes with plastic when I actually close the garden in the winter.

[epitts75]

Carboard boxes are found on craigslist free almost any day of the week and you could put an ad in for the newspaper. I did that and got several responses. I also called the newspaper office and they gave me a huge stack of old unsold papers for free. I just had to come get them. The newspaper in Oxford charged 5 cents per paper, though. Even at that it was pretty cheap.

[jerseymike]

I use (and have always used) old hay, straw or leaves. I collect the bottom of the stack stuff unfit for livestock feed, contact the county they have stacks of the stuff from bales placed around drainage during winter (some may be heavy from being wet, break the bales and load it by flakes). I don't fluff the hay as I lay it down I place it down by the flake.f something pops through, another flake, no plastic, fabric to deal with. Leaves are great and large piles are found at the Cemetery (yeah, I know). The clean-up crews usually blow all of the leaves to one end and pile them near a fence for easy pickup. Salt and vinegar solutions as weed killers work, but they also will kill/run off earthworms and beneficial ground dwellers, salts in the soil take an extremely long time to leach out.

Here's a couple of pictures from last year's garden. This is about a third of the size of the garden, but you get the idea, walk ways covered and keep covered.





Mike

[epitts75]

Oh, Mike. I am so drooling over that garden. So do you never weed at all? Just top up with bales of hay/straw and it keeps the weeds in check? Wow. Just wow.

[jerseymike]

The only weeding needed is close to the plants when they are small since I pull the hay away from them for sun and warmth, once they get going I tuck the hay close to them and very little weeding is needed, just another flake of hay or another fork of leaves. The corn is the only vegetable that I do not mulch this way (but you can) because I flood irrigate it. I leave a tillers width plus 1 foot and anything that comes up between the rows get tilled once a week to keep the soil loose and the weeds turned. Every week there are less and less weeds since the ground is kept moving the seed spends all of it's time germinating and trying to grow it never reaches maturity and reseed. I use a mutated version of a method used and pioneered by Ruth Stout.

It's worked well for me and it's pretty easy after the initial work is done

www.motherearthnews.com/Organic-Gardening/2004-02-01/Ruth-Stouts-System.aspx

Mike

[petey]

wow! That is a beautiful garden! I am writhing in envy!

[epitts75]

I have heard of Ruth Stouts system before but never had enough 'stuff' on hand to garden with. But she says you can use leaves. Our house backs up to several acres of woods so I have leaves free for the taking. I'm going to try it on my second garden which is not raised beds...and is full of weeds. Very exciting!

[catherine]

That's my problem, too, not enough mulch. I've read Ruth Stout's stuff since my Mom passed them on to me and I WANT to do it her way...just put more mulch over the weeds...if and when I ever have the mulch. It's wonderful hearing you corroborate her method. Thank you. And thank you even more for those picture post card worthy photos . That is one spectacularly gorgeous and productive looking garden!!! I"m drooling, too!

[Liz]

For the raised beds themselves, if there is nothing growing in them, cover them with black plastic (black won't let light through to grow anything including mold), held down with bricks. As soon as I harvest a bed if I am not growing anything in it immediately I put down a layer of manure or compost and cover it. When I am ready to use it it is the most gorgeous soil you can imagine!

For the walkways, the Ruth Stout method is the best! If your beds or rows are close together you can fill it in faster, if your beds are farther apart "mowing distance", then it may take a little longer but will work just the same. If you have crews that contract for the electric company to trim branches and trees along the roads, you can ask them to dump the shredded mulch at your place if it is not too far out of the way--or find out where they are dumping and pick it up. Using a variety of products that are readily available will help fill in the walkways faster also.

Good luck! Happy Gardening!

[Jenn]

If you have weeds, you have mulch.<G>
-Jenn

[Deleted]

I have tried black plastic covered with straw on walkways, it works well until the plastic rips from being walked/barrowed on all the time, then the weeds pop through. Actually, my Canada thistle pops up through the plastic regardless. I've seen Canada thistle grow through 15" of mulch. No kidding.

My solution, for the time being, is scrap steel siding. I found someone who had torn down an old shed and sold me the metal relatively cheap. You can probably find some at a junk yard or recycling yard. Obviously, it works GREAT for weed control. That is the biggest benefit. But, when the steel is wet it is slippery, and when the sun shines it is hot. Perhaps if you covered the steel with wood chips that would help.

Another problem with steel is weighting it down, so the wind won't blow it around. Maybe you don't have the prairie winds like I do, though. ;D I am using old 4x4 posts and big rocks and old paver stones, which makes walking over top of it a little treacherous. Here is a link to a picture of what the steel looks like in my garden.

14acres.blogspot.com/2010/04/planting-potatoes.html