In article , Dylan Keon
wrote:

Hi all,

We live in NW Oregon and have a 90' x 30' garden plot that we set up
last spring. It's split into several long raised beds with ~1.5' paths
in between. No boards or anything, just long mounds of soil with paths
in between.

The weeds are a real problem this spring. We tried planting a cover
crop (clover) last fall but it didn't grow that well. We now have a
heavy covering of weeds in both the beds and the paths. I'd like to
create weed free paths for this season (we'll weed and till the beds
when the weather dries up a bit, but I don't want to till the paths),
and also develop a plan for keeping the weeds from coming back in full
force next spring.

My plan for the beds is to use a heavy covering of leaves over all of
them next fall, which will keep the weeds down and will give us
something to till into the soil next spring. For the paths, I'm
currently thinking of weeding, covering with weed barrier cloth, and
then covering with a couple inches of wood chips. I think this idea is
pretty good, but I am concerned about: 1) tilling right next to the weed
barrier cloth, 2) the mess it might make as soil from the beds gets
mixed with the chips, and 3) what a pain it will be to clean up the
chips if we decide to reconfigure the garden.

So, after this long-winded explanantion...can anyone give advice about
using wood chips this way?

Thanks,
Dylan


Skip the barrier cloth, that stuff will at some point sooner or later just
turn out to be in the way. If the between-paths are hemmed in by the
raised beds, you should be able to load on the woodshavings four or six
inches. This'll last for years & years (without nitrogen to assist break
down, a thick path of woodshavings is very long-lasting yet softly
woodland-like to walk on, never apt to get weedy because it's not soil, &
never muddy). And if the arrangement does ever need to be changed, the
shavings need only be mixed into soil to then become compost. MAYBE every
five years it'd be necessary to redo the woodshavings paths since worms
will be working on it from the bottom, but probably only need periodic
scrape off the surface which gets soil spillage mixed in it over time, use
the scrapings for compost, & refresh the top of the pathways -- or just
restore the surface after it compacts down over time. This type of path is
used in one our local swamp parks, & appears to be low-maintenance,
long-lasting, & weed-free even with dense wildwoods seeding left & right.

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/