Here’s a quick-start garden creation system that will smother grass or weeds at the same time it provides an instant garden ready with rich nutrients for immediate planting.
Begin by selecting the garden area and mowing the grass or cutting the weeds as low as you can. While our next step will prevent the grass or weeds from re-growing, do whatever you can to get the existing landscape as low to the ground as possible.
Spread sheets of carboard – deconstructed shipping boxes are perfect – across the planned garden area in a single layer.
Overlap the edges of the cardboard sheets by an inch or two. That will create a more impermeable barrier to grass and weeds trying to push back up from below.
On top of the cardboard, in the growing rows of your future garden, place 3-inch-deep clumps of organic straw, laid end-to-end, leaving a path about 18 inches wide between the rows. The carboard will still be exposed on the paths at this point. The straw is the base for your growing rows. You will need to do a Google search for organic straw available for sale in your area.
Between the growing rows, in the paths, cover the cardboard with an inch or two of mulch or compost. Your garden paths are complete.
On top of the rows of straw, spread a layer of organic topsoil, about 3 inches deep.
Your growing rows are now complete.
You have created a raised-bed garden with incredibly rich growing areas. You can plant any vegetable plants you want at this point.
The straw will break down gradually, releasing new nutrients into the growing areas over time. The cardboard will do the same over a longer period.
The remnants of the grass or weeds that occupied the area previously also will break down, releasing their nutrients back into the soil.
Worms will be attracted to the moist environment under the cardboard and the rich mix of nutrients, loosening the soil and adding their castings to it. Within a few weeks they will begin to show up in the straw and the topsoil you added.
Happy growing.
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