Kill grass and then plant but how??

Simple question but probably not a simple answer but I have to ask.

I want to kill some grass along a fence line in the same area I may be putting some gourds and peas in the ground. I want to kill the grass of course but I want to be able to plant next month after doing so.

Is there anything I can use that will get rid of the grass and not hurt my plants?

Also, I assume that anything in a container will be safe because it won't contact the ground that was treated. Am I right?

 

There's a nice, ecological thing called a "spade".

If I'm not in a hurry I usually cover the space with a thick layer of wet newspapers or some thick black plastic and weigh it down with whatever I've got handy, like rock, timber, planters and whatever.

I've also dug holes for plants and have lined the holes and surrounding area with either newspapers or ground cover. I'm an awfully lazy gardener I'm afraid.

 

Yah, I have already started to manually remove the grass clumps in the main area by hand. I just wanted a slightly more permenant solution for the fence line. I just need to go slow enough for my callouses to develope before I get blisters. I will be putting that black weed barrier stuff down once I have it all dug up and ready for whatever.

Maybe I will try boiling water again, it works on some for a while last year but it did come back pretty thick and with a vengeance.

 

I've also had very good results with layers of wet newspaper with some dirt or mulch thrown on top.

 

Digging is hard work, so I tend to avoid it whenever possible. I posted an entry about making a hosta path in the lazy-Droopy-manner. You could have a look at that and see if it's any help.

http://www.gardenstew.com/about7355.html

 

I'll just add my two cents, if I may :idea: The black weed barrier fabric is not really worth the money.
I would dig the grass out, work your soil and use the newspapers or a mulch to keep weeds down. If it is a large area, you can use Round up, but be sure to read and follow label directions.

 

I tend to agree on the black weed cloth myself. However, I've used sheets of heavy black plastic from contractor grade trash bags with great results. Work best in small areas,obviously.

 

Does the newpaper get slick when it has started to break down and is wet? How much mulch would I need to kill the grass roots and keep down the weeds, less or more than 2 inches? I know cardboard gets really slick once it gets that slimy breakdown film on it. My butt knows that all to well as well as the back of my head.

I got most of the clumps out of the area I am gonna use so that is done, just have to put them out back and start a compost pile. Not too bad but some clumps were really big and it worked better to use one of those 4 prong rakes to get under them and pull them out.

What is it about the weed guard stuff that doesn't work so well? I have never used it on a large scale but I used it over my roses and it worked great for about 2 years. Could I lay that down and put an inch of coconut husk mulch or other mulch over it?

 

I'm all for the hands on approach. It's environmentally safe and that way you can be sure you get everything you want to get. When using your hands to manually pull up the grass, you can make sure you get all the roots, tubers, rhizomes, and etc. which will allow the grass and other plants to come back. It's not a permanent solution, but does work fairly well.

 

I need you to come over here and pull up these clumps for me then. I have to really pull on some of them with the rake at times and some are huge. I did get a couple smaller ones buy hand but only after I loosed the dirt. I am working with some really, REALLLY compact ground right now as it has not been cultivated or loosened in probably, well, ever.

 

When I use newspapers I put them in a tub, soak them well and lay them out like fish scales, making certain they overlap well. The thickness when I'm done is about an inch I guess. Then I cover them with either bought soil or bark chips. They will break down in a couple of years' time, and by then should have suffocated all grass and weeds underneath. I usually repeat the process then, to keep the area low-maintenance.

When I cover an area that I want to dig grass away from I often use plastic bags from either soil or bark chips, and leave them spread out for a couple of weeks. It starts the rotting process, turning the grass and weeds yellow and the roots weak, and they are a lot easier to remove then.

I'd love to come over and help you but the plain tickets are a bit expensive I'm afraid.

 

I soak the newspapers in a wheelbarrow full of water and spread them out, like Droopy described. I personally, haven't had any problems with slipperyness even on on a small pathway where I walk on it often. The amount of mulch I spread over it is a little more than 2 inches... maybe 3 or 4...might be 2 in some places. Depends on how much mulch I have! I'm not very precise.

The weed cloth... the reason I don't care for it is that tougher weeds, vines and grasses have poked right through it. Then when I have pulled the weed, it made the hole even larger, so even more things could poke through. Over time (a season or two) it weakened and became stringy-like and was unhelpful and couldn't be tilled in, as the newspaper bits could be.

I like that idea of using the soil and mulch bags, Droppy! How did I not think of that one?! I always feel bad throwing them away without reusing them for something.

 

Well, I guess that with our reputation for being tight with our money (worse than the Scots'!) we sort of tend to re-use anything that can be re-used.

 

Haha, Droopy! I must be part Norwegian too then! I re-use everything I can.