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Use Weeds Killer to Keep Weeds Out of My Flower Garden?
"nswong" wrote in news:2l7av9F97tkbU1@uni-
berlin.de: For those really lazy guy, that neglect a corner of garden and let small bush or tree grow on top of the landscape fabric, I can't imagine how they will going to separate the landscape fabric from the mulch(humus) on top, soil below, and plant in between. g I find the idea that anyone wuuld let a tree or bush grow on and through landscape fabric ridiculous. I neglect my flower beds for months because they don't need maintenance. After several months, I get a handful of large weeds (hand sized or smaller) that are easily removed. In any event, if someone were to let a tree or shrub grow through the landscape fabric and the plant does not come out easily, it should be a simple matter to slide the mulch aside, cut a circle in the fabric around the bush and pry it out with a mattock, then cut another piece of fabric to patch the hole or plant something else in the opening. Aside from that, I suggested landscape fabric for use in a flower bed, not the corner of a garden. If you've got particularly invasive plants around your flower bed, you've got bigger problems that neither landscape fabric nor mulch will solve. I don't think it is a matter of what is 'correct' but what is the best solution to a given problem. I'm agree with you that there is no single way for every situation. But 'correct' here I'm refer to the claim are true to the fact. No matter how correct your facts are, if they aren't applicable, then it does not matter if they are true or not. I'm also not an expert to say for sure, but for your operation, extensive mulch seems a better idea, and more practical. This still need another few years to test it out when some new need come in. Maybe by the time another alternative fit better than mulch. I'm also looking at live mulch(ground cover) now. At this point I'm not sure what you are referring to. I don't generate enough vegetation to be able to supply myself with mulch or significant amounts of compost, so I use newspaper or fabric. I test out that Perennial peanut(Arachis) work well as live mulch here. It grow low, can grow under shading, not appear to compete with crop plant, do suppress weed germinate from seed, decaying dead root do provide organic matter and nutrient. It make available by exchange carbon for N and P with bacterial(N) and fungus(P). Weed that grow through the live mulch can be weeded by handheld string trimmer or sickle. Additionally, were I to add amendments, I find sliding large pine bark nuggets aside and lifting the fabric (feeder roots smeeder roots) an easier procedure than raking aside mulch that is possibly conmingled with newspaper and soil debris. I don't see the need to raking aside mulch, I will just top dressing the amendments. For a flower bed that needs to be visually appealing, I think it is important to put amendments under the mulch. Depending on nitrogen content, you may also want to bury them to avoid volatilization. If I were to use short term mulch (i.e. not as long lasting as large pine bark nuggets), newspaper might be a better idea, as I could just mix everything together and enrich the soil structure by doing so. As long as you don't over mulch, the mulch will find it way to soil by critter live in it. Having reviewed some of the older messages about landscape fabric, if you're going to grow vegetation that will eventually spred over a flower bed (making removal of landscape fabric more difficult), it really doesn't make sense to use long term weed suppression, as once established, theoretically, the vegetation should be effective in limiting weed growth to acceptable levels. Certainly in this case you would want to use something that degrades, replacing as necessary until the relevant plant is established and doing its own weed control, I think people call this vegetation as ground cover or live mulch depend on situation. When I wrote that i wasn't thinking of groundcovers as much as a low shrub with wide sunblocking canopy. I don't know if that qualifies as a 'groundcover'. The problems I have with groundcovers (such a creeping groundcover), aside from ignorance and cheapness, is there is a potential to create a diverse microcosm in your flower bed. So in addition to 'soil critters' you have created another layer of habitat for whatever insects or animals that move in and the other plants you have (barring any symbiosis) will have to compete with the groundcover. If you don't know what you are doing, there is the potential for many problems, hence the need for 'people who can garden their way out of a bank vault'. the exception being if said vegetation will die back in the winter, in which case you can plan your amending accordingly and/or resign yourself to using short term suppression or other methods. I will suggest using plant debris for supplement in this situation. Any plant debris I have either goes in the garbage or compost pile for the vegetable garden. |
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