In article , Gurrie
wrote:

I am turning some of m,y lawn into garden areas for shrubs and bushes etc.

Cut the turf out today using a turf cutter as it was going into someone
else's yard.

What should I now be doing to prepare the area? I was going to rotary hoe
it and combine it with some mushroom compost but I am concerned about the
existing couch roots that remain and I fear that they will grow back in
amongst the new plants.

I plan to put down weed mat but I know that it is 100% fail safe with weeds
so I guess couch will be able to grow back through this stuff.

What should I do? Put down plastic instead of or with the weed mat?
Something else altogether?

I really hate to admit this, but the only thing I have found that deals
with cooch is Glyphosate (Roundup/Zero). All other weeds I pull by
hand, but no matter how far down I go to get rid of cooch, if there is
part of a root left, or if it is growing anywhere nearby, it will
reappear again and again. If you have a cooch lawn nearby, you will
find it popping up in your garden beds from time to time, regardless of
what you do.

But, if you are prepared to use the herbicide, it works well. It is
supposed to be non residual - once it hits the soil it should break
down and not poison anything else. You just have to be certain not to
get it on anything else. A neat trick I saw to help with this, is to
wear an absorbent cotton glove *over a non porous rubber glove*. You
can then dip your fingers in the Zero, and wipe them specifically on
the leaves of the weeds you want to target.

Take Care, and Good Luck

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