I'm not sure I understand your question, but I've had good experiences pulling up spent plants in the fall and covering the area with cardboard. Some people cover the cardboard with grass clippings, straw, or well-rotted manure. I've done that, but I've also left the cardboard bare. By spring it's practically part of the soil, and you have a weed-free area for next year's garden.

Just leave a little space and some unobstructed soil for the seeds. Alternatively, place the paper and straw around them after the seedlings get their first or second set of true leaves. The weeds will be young and tender then too and will not survive being covered by the paper/mulch.

Sandyman, that is the problem with mulch. It gives you no weeds now and it will eventually give you a thin layer of weed-free soil, but until then, direct seeding is a problem. Solution: in a new bed, plant only plants for a couple of years, and mulch heavily.

In my case, I also punch holes in the mulch (I use a tent stake), fill with fine, sifted compost, one handful per hill, and place seeds in the compost. If you are willing to do the work, it works for plants as small as lettuce, but I skip the carrots, arugula and radish until the bed is established, the original mulch is gone, and both the topsoil is fine and the weeds are few.

I just did it this weekend, four beds mulched with wood chips. I planted them with radicchio, turnip, lacinato kale, and kale. I had to use every bit of compost in the trash can, about 50 lbs, to do it.

The first year of new lasagna beds worked great for me. The previous year I had built the beds with layers of grass clippings, old leaves, etc. In the spring I topped it off with some well composted horse manure. The horse owner had added bedding, kitchen scraps and wood ashes during the winter and turned it. Nice black stuff and hardly any weeds that first year.

Year 3 began with weeds I hadn't removed at the end of my second gardening year. We have some nasty witch grass and another creeping weed that was taking over the edges of the bed. My beds are raised in mounds but don't have wood sides. In early spring I put down black plastic to warm the soil. After a month, the weeds had been killed and were easy to remove. That bed is not densely planted with tomatoes. I keep meaning to put a border of wet newspapers covered with grass clippings but haven't done it yet. I have in other places.

Last weekend I tore out the spent sugar snap pea plants and discovered a lot of weeds had gotten in and around the plants but because the base was rotted newspaper and leaves and never walked on, it was pretty easy to pull all the weeds out. Right now the parsnip bed is edged with newspaper/grass clippings and looks completely weed free.

It really helps to have a good hand weeder. I have an L-shaped weeder similar to a cape cod weeder. Loosen the soil and then you can pull the weed. If it has a trailing root, the weeder can help scoop it out. I also find that wear garden gloves with a rubber coating (bought at the farm store) make pulled weeds easier. I drag the weeder thru the soil to uproot tiny weeds between rows.

I think the best advantage of a raised bed is that the soil stays nice and loose making weeding easier. I think weeds are a fact of life but a variety of methods keep them at a minimu.

I gave up trying to fight weeds years ago. I do virtually everything through black plastic. This year I even started my root crops as transplants in cell packs and transplanted them, and for the most part that has worked out fine.

I would never do it any other way again.

How does it work with veggies that like cool feet, Dennis? Things such as cole crops or celery, or even potatoes. I have the impression that even plum tomatoes (sensitive to BER) can be helped by a cool soil.

This year I planted a garden in an area that hadn't had a garden in at least 16 years. In February, I tilled the area with a Troy-bilt tiller. I tilled it again every few days. Mostly because it was fun. I didn't get much in the way of weeds as I discovered a great organic cure. The Scuffle Hoe and the Rogue Hoe.

We scuffle hoe every morning except our day of rest. It takes less than 10 minutes to do 1,000 sq. feet of planted areas. If it's after a rain, I use the Rogue Hoe which cuts through wet soil better.

Since learning about the scuffle hoe, I've become more precise in the way I plant so I can hoe between seeds before they sprout. We mark every seed with a popsicle stick. Or if there are a lot of seeds close together we mark the row of seeds. This also helps me position the drip tape better as they tend to move around.

Here is a video of me using the scuffle hoe: http://www.youtube.coam/user/bnaiorpueblo#p/c/64D03F492F3DBF8E/0/10jJxyDFWPQ