In her book "Earthly Delights" (which I would recommend) Margot Rochester
suggests that to create a new garden bed lay down eight layers of newspaper
and then place compost on it, and then cover with leaves. She does not
suggest digging up the ground underneath. It sounds like a good process, but
my wife wonders about the ink the newspaper. Will it cause any harm if you
grow vegtables. Any opinions?

Thanks

Tom

Check the masthead of the newspapers. You may see a message saying it's
printed with soy-based ink. That's not monstrous stuff, and you're only
going to go through this process once.

On the other hand, you could invest in a REALLY nice spade and a
fine-grained flat file to sharpen it every few hours. The sharpening takes a
minute, and the spade will slip under grass like a hot knife through butter.
Well....not quite that easily....but easier than you might think. Hire a
local kid to use a hand cultivator and knock the excess soil off of the
resulting sod clumps. No reason to throw away excellent soil - it should
stay in the garden bed.

"mary" wrote in message
...
In her book "Earthly Delights" (which I would recommend) Margot Rochester
suggests that to create a new garden bed lay down eight layers of
newspaper
and then place compost on it, and then cover with leaves. She does not
suggest digging up the ground underneath. It sounds like a good process,
but
my wife wonders about the ink the newspaper. Will it cause any harm if you
grow vegtables. Any opinions?

Thanks

Tom

Doug Kanter wrote:

Check the masthead of the newspapers. You may see a message saying it's
printed with soy-based ink...




I believe that virtually all newspapers use soy based inks now. I rather
doubt that the newspapers can even buy the old ink that has heavy metals
in it these days. AFAIK, only the colored sections of the newspapers had
the heavy metals anyway.

Magazines are another issue. (no pun intended).

The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:


"mary" wrote in message
...
In her book "Earthly Delights" (which I would recommend) Margot Rochester
suggests that to create a new garden bed lay down eight layers of
newspaper
and then place compost on it, and then cover with leaves. She does not
suggest digging up the ground underneath. It sounds like a good process,
but
my wife wonders about the ink the newspaper. Will it cause any harm if you
grow vegtables. Any opinions?

Check the masthead of the newspapers. You may see a message saying it's
printed with soy-based ink. That's not monstrous stuff, and you're only
going to go through this process once.

I use flattened cardboard cartons instead; available free form shops.
For the covering layer I use lawn grass clippings, seaweed, bracken,
wood ash, manure; whatever raw, compostable material I can get. Very
quickly, worms start working in it, and birds start stirring up the
materials looking for the worms; so it isn't long before the raw
ingredients break down into brown friable composty material.

Janet.

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:


"mary" wrote in message
...
In her book "Earthly Delights" (which I would recommend) Margot
Rochester
suggests that to create a new garden bed lay down eight layers of
newspaper
and then place compost on it, and then cover with leaves. She does not
suggest digging up the ground underneath. It sounds like a good
process,
but
my wife wonders about the ink the newspaper. Will it cause any harm if
you
grow vegtables. Any opinions?

Check the masthead of the newspapers. You may see a message saying it's
printed with soy-based ink. That's not monstrous stuff, and you're only
going to go through this process once.

I use flattened cardboard cartons instead; available free form shops.
For the covering layer I use lawn grass clippings, seaweed, bracken,
wood ash, manure; whatever raw, compostable material I can get. Very
quickly, worms start working in it, and birds start stirring up the
materials looking for the worms; so it isn't long before the raw
ingredients break down into brown friable composty material.

Janet.

Sounds great, unless you need it ready to plant within a few days.

Doug Kanter wrote:

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:


"mary" wrote in message
...
In her book "Earthly Delights" (which I would recommend) Margot
Rochester
suggests that to create a new garden bed lay down eight layers of
newspaper
and then place compost on it, and then cover with leaves. She does not
suggest digging up the ground underneath. It sounds like a good
process,
but
my wife wonders about the ink the newspaper. Will it cause any harm if
you
grow vegtables. Any opinions?

Check the masthead of the newspapers. You may see a message saying it's
printed with soy-based ink. That's not monstrous stuff, and you're only
going to go through this process once.

** I use flattened cardboard cartons instead; available free form shops.
For the covering layer I use lawn grass clippings, seaweed, bracken,
wood ash, manure; whatever raw, compostable material I can get. Very
quickly, worms start working in it, and birds start stirring up the
materials looking for the worms; so it isn't long before the raw
ingredients break down into brown friable composty material.

** Janet.

Sounds great, unless you need it ready to plant within a few days.

FWIW
I wanted ground cover around a newly planted, fairly large tree, so i
did the newspaper thing, spread about 2 - 3" of soil and peat on
top and stuck a bunch of Dragon's Blood creepers in.
They were weed free the first two summers and by that time were
well enough established to hold off the weeds on their own.

Ma
*

The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...

I use flattened cardboard cartons instead; available free form shops.
For the covering layer I use lawn grass clippings, seaweed, bracken,
wood ash, manure; whatever raw, compostable material I can get. Very
quickly, worms start working in it, and birds start stirring up the
materials looking for the worms; so it isn't long before the raw
ingredients break down into brown friable composty material.

Janet.

Sounds great, unless you need it ready to plant within a few days.

You can still plant straight away with card. I've used two methods;
when planting a new comfrey patch into weed-infested, undug ground, I
made slits with a pade, rammed in rows of comfrey root, then laid the
card up to, but not covering, the comfrey slips, and covered with mulch.
All weeds were smothered and the comfrey thrived.

The other method, is to lay out your bed as I described then rake back
a little mulch, cut a planting-size hole through the card with a knife,
plant shrub/fruit bush or whatever, and tuck the mulch back to prevent
weeds.

I should perhaps add that where I garden has plenty of rain all year
round (about 70 " per annum).

Janet (Ilse of Aran, Scotland).

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...

I use flattened cardboard cartons instead; available free form
shops.
For the covering layer I use lawn grass clippings, seaweed, bracken,
wood ash, manure; whatever raw, compostable material I can get. Very
quickly, worms start working in it, and birds start stirring up the
materials looking for the worms; so it isn't long before the raw
ingredients break down into brown friable composty material.

Janet.

Sounds great, unless you need it ready to plant within a few days.

You can still plant straight away with card. I've used two methods;
when planting a new comfrey patch into weed-infested, undug ground, I
made slits with a pade, rammed in rows of comfrey root, then laid the
card up to, but not covering, the comfrey slips, and covered with mulch.
All weeds were smothered and the comfrey thrived.

The other method, is to lay out your bed as I described then rake back
a little mulch, cut a planting-size hole through the card with a knife,
plant shrub/fruit bush or whatever, and tuck the mulch back to prevent
weeds.

I should perhaps add that where I garden has plenty of rain all year
round (about 70 " per annum).

Janet (Ilse of Aran, Scotland).

But Janet....I *like* digging for an entire weekend and then melting into a
chair with some Lagavulin (for the muscle aches) and admiring my work! :-)

The message
from "Doug Kanter" contains these words:

But Janet....I *like* digging for an entire weekend and then melting into a
chair with some Lagavulin (for the muscle aches) and admiring my work! :-)

Dig, Doug, dig. Nobody said you couldn't.

:-)

Janet.