If you do some searches in several gardenweb forums, you will find that most people avoid using landscape fabric. Not only avoid it, but rip it up and destroy it!

It does not prevent weeds as advertised, but also creates the problems you've mentioned. It truly hinders the free percolation of water to the soil as well as the essential exchange of soil and atmospheric gases.

Landscape fabric is best used in permanent pathways.

I use cardboard as a base and then soil on top. Earthworms seem to love cardboard or even newspapers. Anything that keeps light out will kill LOST weeds.

Our neighbors used landscape fabric and they have weeds.

I think Landscape fabric and MONSTER cable for stereos is just a marketing thing.

I second everyone's comments above. Don't use landscape fabric. I used it years ago when I didn't know better. I still regret it to these days, because it has caused so much trouble in the garden. I still cannot find all the fabric I put in so I can rip it out.

Yes, cardboards or sheets of newspaper are best to put under mulch. In fact, they are the best materials to use to start a new bed without doing any digging or removing the grass if you want to take over the lawn.

Bulbs cannot come up through landscape fabric. Eventually weeds will though or they will grow on top.

Agree with above. Rip it out and be done with it.

Yep....get rid of that nasty stuff.
My neighbor just put down what is likely 500 square feet of plastic covered with rock and a few plants around the edge....
I can't wait until he has to weed the rocks!
Linda c

If you want your bulbs to come up you have to cut the fabric where the bulbs are planted. As far as using the fabric, it has its pros and cons. I use it under river rocks and it works very good. You will still get some weeds here and there, but nothing like NOT using it.
It depends on your soil. If the area where you plan to lay it has "weeds from hell" i would definitely buy the thickest they sell. If you only get a few weeds, don't bother. Just pull em'.

I agree with mayhem69 and rhizo 1. When I started out, I used it only in the backyard flower beds. After using it for two years I switch to telephone books and newspaper. I found the fabric was a complete waste of money. The weeds just grew on top of it like the fabric was soil.

ohhhhhh cr@p... i fell for the hype and used it on a huge bulb bed. Damn. I was trying to cover up all the wild violets (They look amazing with the bulbs though and that bed is full of bulbs).

I should have known it was too good to be true. I won't tell hubby. I had him on his hands and knees for 2 days...

Weeds don't grow from the soil....ionce you kill tham with round up or by digging or smother with mulch. Weeds grow from seeds dropped or blown in and will grow in the crevasses between rocks or in mulch even if there is fabric beneath.
Granted, it takes a few years for enough soil and other small bits of stuff to land in the rocks, enough to support a weed, but it will happen and then the roots will go into that fabric and be almost impossible to pull out. You have not lived until you have tried to get rid of bind weed that has it's roots in landscape fabric which is covered in rock.
If the area you plan to plant has "weeds from hell" kill them or smother them with paper.....they will be just as dead as if you laid fabric....and your bulbs will be able to get through.
Send him on a trip and then rip that stuff out!!
Linda C

I'm from Pa. and do alot of landscape in these parts. There are areas that have endless weed vines. I do not know what these weeds are called, but i call them "weeds from hell". Roundup will not kill these weeds, "smothering" them will only piss them off. It is an endless cycle of spraying and weed pulling.
If you have weeds like i am talking about buy the thickest weed carpet you can find, the real good stuff that you have a hard time cutting with a razor knife. Lay the fabric down and place your plants where you want. Cut holes in the fabric where you want to plant.
If your weeds pull out nice and easy, and they aren't vines, i would not use carpet.
I know everybody on this forum is against weed carpet, but sometimes it is needed in certain "weeds from hell" situations. - Mayhem

"Weeds from hell" usually means one or more of the following: inadequate mulch, spacing plants too widely apart for them to choke out weeds, or too much garden and too little time.

My list of disadvantages to using landscape fabric: expense, need to replace the stuff when it eventually degrades, lack of flexibility in moving plants around, having the stuff block your efforts to divide plants, not having self-seeding of desirable plants, inability to improve soil through feeding mulches or amendments, having weeds grow anyway in mulch or stone that's placed atop the fabric, and possible inhibition of moisture absorption in the soil under the fabric (soil under fabric tends to get compacted and does not appear to absorb water normally).

If there are problem weeds, using newspaper covered with a good feeding mulch will block weed growth and ultimately produce a healthier soil. It works nicely.

I would definately rip that landscape fabric out of your bulb bed! Some years back when using this fabric was very popular...we went for it also,,,,,what a mess....weeds grew right thru the stuff and the beds were so hard to maintain.
Also, most of the flowers that i plant i want them to spread and /or multiply.

carol

My husband and I had this "debate" two years ago. He insisted on landscape fabric and just wouldn't let go of the idea. So, we put landscape fabric down in only one section of the garden and none in the other sections.

You can not imagine the curse words that have come out of my mouth whenever I try to garden in the fabric section. Whenever I dig a hole, I try my best to tear out big sections. I am positive that this fabric prevented adequate drainage during the winter months and has taken the lives of a number of plants. I think I have most of it pulled out now, but he continues to wonder why his blue rug juniper (his section of the garden) haven't spread and covered the bank.

DON'T use the stuff unless you're putting it underneath hardscape.

Cameron

It's horrible stuff! Get it out!

I don't use fabric for ll the reasons stated above. But just by accident I've found something that will kill weeds over a week or 2 during nice sunny hot weather. You can buy a small piece at most garden centers that sell supplies for water gardens.I call it rubber roofing (aka pond liner) that I have had for 10 years left over from a roofing job on my rental property. I keep moving it around using it to kill grass around my shed that my bad back doesn't allow me to keep trimmed. It heats up like crazy during the day so that you can't walk on it barefoot, so imagine what it does underneath! Shingles work too, but not as fast.I have an entire bed outline with shingles, bought from Lowes marked down to $10 pk because the pk was damaged. You can do 40 ft or more with a package. YOu can place edging rocks on one side and mulch on the other, or just do half. If you overlap them, they will seal and you can mow right over them, but you have a high powered riding mower like I have, I've found that I have to put stakes around the corners, or else they move. So if you want to kill out spots of weeds, I'd just cut the rubber stuff into the size you need and leave it on for a week or 2 then move it on to another place.