I think it can take up to a year to "blackout" the grass completely. If you put down several layers of newspaper, water it in good and then put 4-6 inches of soil on top of it that might work quicker.

Well, there's a change in plans. I was honestly looking at a week or two, the way it usually behaves where a pot or a stepping stone is placed. Guess I'll just have to use the shovel. Thank you for your concern.

Oh dear god... I have read that it should only take a couple of weeks and have our entire front yard covered with black plastic and very, very heavy concrete pavers. If it takes more than a month I am going to have a nervous breakdown!

All I can do is laugh about it and break out the shovel. Unless somebody knows a less laborious way that doesn't cost too much and doesn't hurt the animals. (we have bunny rabbits in the neighborhood). And I'm talking about a relatively tiny 3'x20' area.

sailor86, if the grass is Bermuda, IMHO, digging will only make it spread and you will still have it in the beds. There is no "quick fix" for getting rid of Bermuda.

I'm not much of an identifier to know what kind of grass we've got. Here when the sun comes out a bit, I'll snap a photo or two and figure out what I've got. I see you're from around here, Carrie751. Is that what you've got?

Put down roofing paper and cover it with 6 " of good garden soil. More if you have it, as this holds the paper down and keeps the grass smothered. Cover the soil with 4" or so of mulch. She can go a head and plant the next day. Like a raised bed.

Before
January 2008

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Three to 4 months later.
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After
JULY 2008

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Back yard. No digging, except where an individual plant was planted.

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Wow! Pretty nice work. I'd love to be able to do half the job you've done. These photos are from West Texas? Am I right? Besides Hill Country, I believe East Texas is one of the most scenic parts of the state. Maybe I'll get out there someday.

Somewhere on another post, I told of the bermuda that has lived under concrete, that I am still fighting in my flower beds near by. Kathy may have the answer to a quicker fix if she, indeed, covered Bermuda. What kind of grass did you cover, Kathy???

You can do it, if two old "widder" ladies can do it.
I live in San Antonio.

Carrie, the grass is mixed SA and Bermuda. Notice my critter planted cantelope on the sidewalk, in the 2nd pic above. I got two before the spidermites and heat did it in.

Here you can see that the ash tree was removed.
Late Feb 2008

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October 2008
The yellow brug (originally from Carrie)is near where the ash trees used to be and the asters are next to the driveway.

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Feb 2009
African daisies to the left of where the aster are re-emerging.

About 15 stalks of the old purple isris are open today. I need batteries for my camera.

Even a man needs an outlet. I thought a pickup truck would make me a man. I was wrong. LOL.

LOL!
That Miata belongs to my friend. I happen do drive an F150 super crew.

Well, sailor, maybe that is your answer. It certainly seems to have worked WELL for Kathy. Lot less work involved as well. I have just come in from digging Bermuda roots away from beds before it gets inside them, so now is not a good time for me to be talking about Bermuda.
PJ, I thought you would have chimed in by now......

I can change the oil, but how do you Drive that thing?

Doesn't roofing paper have creosote in it? Might want to be careful using that with anything edible, at least I would.

I've been pondering the 'grass' question myself.

What a simple and elegant solution!

Treating it "just like a raised bed" - that makes sense. Why not?
I think I might try to hunt down some large sheets of cardboard to lay down instead of roofing paper. Seems like by the time it disintegrates beneath the soil the grass will be dead. And any grass that comes up I could pull out or hit with Roundup. Anybody ever use this method for raised beds or new garden areas?

I think I'll check with the store that sells the big kitchen appliances and see if they don't have some big boxes (like refrigerator boxes).

What a nice design. You did a beautiful job!

Creosote. Not a good friend of the digestive system. We've got a roll of something that is explicitly for gardening purposes. I don't right now have access to it but I'll let you know what it is.

I just put the finishing touches on 4 raised beds in my back yard. There was grass and weeds growing underneath so I put landscape timbers in to make the beds, then put a layer of landscape paper down to completely cover the grass. Then I put 7 to 8 inches of garden soil down. No chance the grass will get through that -- at least I'm hoping. I am also going to put down a good layer of mulch once I get all my plants in the beds.

Sorry, I was not clear, I did not put the roofing paper where I grow edibles.
Plus, I bought the cheapest they carried, which had precious little on it.

Got the answer. A product by Easy Gardener called Weed Block. Made from recycled plastic bottles. Comes in a 3'x25' roll. Should do the trick.

Sailor, I hate to be the one to give you bad news. Weedblock is a nightmare if you ever want to take it out. Also tough to cut through to dig for planting. You might want to put cardboard instead. Bremuda roots in weedblock take "TNT" to get them out. If you have not opened it, my advice is to return it. But you did not ask for my advice, did you.
I have put down sheets of newspaper, and added shovelfuls of soil to hold it down until I had the whole area covered.

I used cardboard last summer with leaves, grass clippings, and compost layered on. No weeds this spring and a wonderful worm filled area for planting. I love it and it was super easy.

The one thing no one has mentioned is the tremendous expense involved in smothering grass with papers and mulch. Unless you can find a free source, it is prohibitively expensive. We were planning that very thing and the cheapest estimate we could find was $600 to do all of the grass. And that's with lugging it and delivering it ourselves.

What about tilling? We scored an electric tiller for $50 today off of Craigslist. That's my last hope.

Tilling can work if you do it several times. But if you just do it once, at least in my experience, all you do is spread the seeds and reinvigorate a deep rooted grass.

I guess the 'blackout' method is preferred mainly because it's faster and it works. I don't know what method professional landscapers use. That would be interesting to get their opinion.

I'm going to try to clear an area for a garden under some big live oaks but haven't figured out yet how to get rid of the very deep rooted little weed shrubs except to poison each one (very carefully). And then there are all the baby oaks that carpet the area under the oaks as well. I don't think there are any fast and easy solutions for that.