On Fri, 20 Jun 2003 18:35:58 -0700, kswank wrote:

Hello all,

I am a first time home owner in Southern California. Our backyard has a
pretty steep slope which is all weeds. My wife and I would like to start
planted various flowers, small trees and maybe even some vegetables. What I
am wondering is what is the best way to get rid of all of the weeds and
prepare the soil for growing anything?

Thank you all for your time.


Good day kswank. If you and your wife are novice gardeners, I would
suggest that you get a planting design from a landscape designer. This may
cost a few hundred dollars but it's well worth the cost in the long run.
Novice mistakes can cost quite a bit of money to correct latter on. Also a
garden designer maybe able to show you plants that you may not of
concidered.

As far as removing the weeds and soil preperation goes your options as
straight forward.
Weeds can be removed by hand ( digging and pulling ) or chemically (
herbicide ). Depending on the size of the property in question, hand
pulling may not be a reasonable option but if your area is small it might
be more cost effective to hand weed. If you choose the chemical option,
I'd suggest that you use finale. I personaly feel that it's safer than
round-up. Check out finale yourself:
http://www.biconet.com/lawn/finale.html

As far as soil preparation goes you can either create good soil by adding
orgainc matter (compost) or you can buy soil and add to the native soil
base. I would advise that you use a bit of caution when you disturb the
soil if your slope is steep. You don't want to create errosion of your
bank.
Good luck with your hill......
--
http://yard-works.netfirms.com
Bellingham, Washington
Georgia straits area
Zone 8a usda