Remove Grass for a Garden Bed
Many readers ask how to remove the grass from the garden door. Whether you are clearing a portion of a lawn or clearing a field or restoring an old weed garden, we are here to help. Most importantly, if your soil is wasted or neglected, you need to reclaim it to produce it again!
Your Garden Location
Before clearing your lawn or land for a garden, you can start with four basics for choosing a good gardening site:
The sun! Most plants need sunlight. If you are planting a vegetable garden, the crops need 6 to 8 hours of direct sunlight so they will not be too shady.
Avoid land with lots of rocks or invasive grasses (such as jansongras and invisible bermudagrass) as it can be very difficult for your garden to be successful.
Avoid flooded or steep slopes as they may present water and access-related challenges.
Heavy clay soils can also be challenging; In this case, we recommend elevated bed gardens.
We are going to divide this area into two parts: 1. Clearing the lawn for a garden and 2. Clearing the unused land for a large garden or small farm.
Removing grass for a garden
The best time to do this project is in autumn. It provides time to restore and nourish the soil with organic corrections (compost) in the fall and early winter and early spring.
We like to use the first “suffocation method” with the cardboard box, but we’ve included two methods that gardeners use for the chemical approach: solarization and manual digging.
1. Smoking method
Define your garden bed. Take a pipe or string or rope and outline the shape of the garden. A rectangle is easy.
Start by cleaning the surface of debris and rocks larger than chicken eggs. Cut the grass or mow the weeds in the ground.
If there are a lot of weeds in the ground you want to grow, place a layer of cardboard or 8 to 10 newspaper sheets down and glue the edges at least 6 inches to each other. If you use newspaper, make sure there is only black ink on the sheets (no color) and the card should not be waxed. Mark the paths between the beds using a thick cardboard box lined with thick overlays. This will help eliminate weeds between growing areas. You can cover the cardboard box with bar chips or after.
Moisten it well to help break the card. The card will be a further barrier to weeds, and fatigue will eventually kill most of them. Once the growing season begins, you will find that it will be much easier to get rid of the weeds that deal with it.
Now add a thick layer of well-rotted organic matter. Add compost 3 to 4 inches thick on paper or cardboard. If progressed rapidly for a few months the grass and weeds below will rot and return that wonderful nitrogen back to the soil. Earthworms gradually attach organic matter to the soil below. You left loose, dark, moist soil without weeds.
If the organic matter in your bed at the time of planting is lumpy, start planting vegetable seedlings in plug trays or pots as soon as they develop a firm root system. This will make it easier to place the plants at regular intervals and save time thinning the rows of seedlings.
Quick versions for changing the frame to the garden
Smothering technique
Follow the thin technique above using stacked newspaper. This quick technology assumes you have good soil (against weed, neglected, spent soil).
Soak the newspaper layers in water.
Keep plants at the right distance (as indicated by your plant labels)
Cut a wet newspaper to dig a small planting hole for each.
Sow excess dirt on paper and spread
Cover all newspapers with a few inches of mulch. If you are planting a vegetable patch, cover with straw (against mulch) is another option.
If you have clay soil, you can make raised beds in their lawns and stack a cardboard box to cover the grass - this is a technique that will help fill the beds and start gardening immediately.
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