So we are building a new garden bed and are really considering weed cloth or deer cloth as it's called. Our idea is to put it on the top of the bed and cut holes where the plants come through because it supposedly let's water through fine but blocks weeds. Have any of you used this type of product before? Is it any good? Thanks guys and gals!
We used to use weed block but found it ineffective.. We built raised beds and add compost yearly and only use hand tools and never step on the beds.. Soil stays pliable and weeds pull out pretty easy normally.. BTW pallets make good compost bins.. Ray
We are gonna lay pallets out to use as beds actually. They are perfect for what we want... There is a 50 gallon drum two hub assembly's and a pile of angle iron going to be used as a compost barrel that can be turned once a day. Well if I ever get the time that is...
Ray summed it up. We had a raised bed, of mushroom soil mixed with top soil, planted everything and actually had some mulch left over so threw that on top. This kept the weed growth down.
Hmm it appears there is different kinds showing on google! What have you tried Ray? I am gonna do the wood chip idea on the veggies I think and the cloth I'll try on the flowers. DB what brand do you use?
Don't have a specific brand. It is tough finding the fabric around here. (I am way out in the boonies.) I usually have to pick it up at Home Depot, Lowes, or Walmart when I go to town. I am too tired now but I will take a picture of what I have done sometime this week.
If you mulch over the fabric weeds will sprout in the mulch. Easy to pull them though as they are shallow rooted. Its a pain though to make changes to the bed in my opinion. I also like to fluff up the soil occasionally so I don't use it.
Good landscape fabric works great, but it is pricey. Cheap landscape fabric breaks down quickly and isn't worth the trouble. When I worked at a greenhouse/nursery we had the good stuff and it covered about an acre...the best stuff you can buy...and still got some weeds. If you're just doing a few raised beds I'd mulch the crap out of it with whatever grass clipping/leaves/wood chips you can find, then turn it back into the soil at the end of the season. The problem with landscape fabric on raised beds is it does drain water off rather than letting it all soak in, and it also raises the soil temperature (which is already higher on a raised bed). Some plants don't mind it (peppers and tomatoes), but others hate it (rabbit food stuff).
Ray, I have 6 compost bins made out of pallets, we plant squash in 5 of them and continue composting in the 6th. I capped off the first pile with dirt for planting earlier this week by moving some dirt from a raised planter that is no longer getting enough sunlight. Pile number 2 will likely be capped in a couple of days, currently taking care of the fruit tree fertilizing and other digging in the dirt chores, most of today was spent on pounding fertilizer spikes into the ground, setting up my new lawnmower, followed by mowing most of the lawn for the first time this year (always the slowest mowing) . Got to reset the chicken restraint fence around the garden area also (it does secondary duty as a Bambi dissuader). Still looking out for wood chucks.
I've used it successfully for spinach, lettuce and melons. Stones or the recommended staples to hold it down. I save chewed up leaves in the Fall in a 6 foot pile to use as mulch and it actually works pretty good. Till it in in the Spring or Fall or not, whatever you have or don't have time for. I found fabric has to come up in the Fall or I get moles/voles living under it in the Winter. I haven't had much luck with mulch on top in a flower garden either , weeds growing in the mulch.
Some of the best tomatoes have grown out of the compost bin! Also decent butternut squash and my old pallet compost bin grew it's own peach tree
I already have a peach tree, a plum tree, two apple trees, 3 pear trees none from a compost pile though, however I did grow over 100 winter squash of various varieties in them one year, last year in addition to some squash I got some volunteer tomatoes and potatoes. We create about 6 to 7 yards of compost that ends up in the garden and then we start all over again. Tons of leaves, grass clippings, old vegetable vines, plus what comes out to the chicken coops. Time it just right and you can get two loads a year. Been using pallets for bins for decades. The new lawnmower can be used to bag lawn clippings, mulch, or simply discharge and I'll likely do mulching after the first mowing is done.
I think your on to something! I have a bed that was overtaken by grass ( last years zucchini bed, that wasn't used for a 2nd planting.) It's the heavily rooted, viney type of grass too. I plan to add some compost this year and cover the top, it will be used for cukes this year. (However since I haven't planted yet, its been covered with rubber roofing so nothing grows.) I also started one of last years beds (Mushroom mulch, vermiculite and peat to start) with broccoli. I put a layer of cardboard on TOP, and so far, I like it. This year two new beds were made in the same area, started with a layer of cardboard, so far so good. I know the cardboard will break down over time, and I will eventually have grass to deal with, hoping the broccoli, and cauliflower keep them out.
Cardboard and paper take a long time to break down.. This works well to reduce weeds especially well rooted weeds! Ray
I've heard carpet works well for weed control and will let water soak through. I haven't tried it myself since this is our first year of raised beds.
