Backyard taken over by weeds..?

9 years ago

We moved into a new property in the fall. I'd always lived in apartments before this so don't have landscaping experience.

The grass was pretty dead and full of weeds. I tried tackling it at the time on my own but hardly accomplished anything in the many hours I spent at it. I had tried removing it all manually with various tools - shovel, regular garden hoe, action hoe, etc. To make things worse, there is some green netting all throughout the yard a few inches below the ground's surface - perhaps for erosion control. Weeds were tangled in this. (Side question - would this netting prevent plants from building strong, deep roots?)

I gave up and let it all go through winter. With spring though, I'm intent on having a nice flower and shrub garden in one area, a pond in one area and a raised-bed vegetable garden in another.

I'm afraid to use chemicals because I will be planting some edibles in ground (a fruit tree and some grapevines).

I want a nice smooth surface beneath the raised beds. I want to lay down some type of small gravel. Obviously do not want weeds coming up through this. Some type of weed "blanket" would be fine here (cardboard/newspaper?). Elsewhere in the yard though, where I'll be planting in ground, I'm not sure what to do. I need some plan. I need to get started soon. Do I rent a tiller? How do I get rid of this sea of weeds?

Featured Answer

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)

9 years ago

Sod is often attached to (actually grown through) a plastic netting as it hold the rolls or sheet together during transport and installation. Hydroseeding is just spraying in a slurry of grass seed, fertilizer and some sort of cellulose stabilizer - no netting involved.

You want raised beds to be in contact with the underlying soil - no gravel or weed cloth. Smothering the existing growth with overlapping layers of cardboard is easy and effective and it will decompose in time, allowing the roots of the raised bed plants to penetrate down as deeply as they like.

Using a prepared herbicide according to label directions is really the best way to approach weeds in the lawn, particularly if there are more weeds than lawn. In fact, if it is really bad, razing the entire lawn and starting over may be the simplest way to go. As long as you don't spray any herbicides (plant killers) directly on what you are going to eat (and if you think about, it that makes no sense anyway!!), then there is really very little concern. Most of these products breakdown in the soil quite rapidly with rain/irrigation and the activity of the soil biology into harmless elements and they are not taken up into the plants or fruit.

Weeds in dedicated planting beds that already contain valuable or desired perennials and shrubs are best handled with manual removal to avoid damaging the desired plants - herbicides can't tell the difference between a weed or anything else that might be growing :-) If you do not intend to add any plantings in these areas right away, then smothering with cardboard will work well too, at least for most weeds. Cover the cardboard with a good thick layer of mulch to keep it damp and hasten decomposition.

And mulch any other bare ground after removing any weeds. Mulch is about the best weed suppressor there is and is of multiple benefits to the garden.

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Comments (7)

Carolina Girl (Zone 8b)
9 years ago
Was this new construction?Was the netting over the whole yard? Almost sounds like it was hydro seeded. Have no other idea why netting would have been put down.

I'd think twice about pea gravel/rocks. My yard was lined with rocks over plastic when we moved in 17yrs ago. We removed them and we are still finding them to this day. They look nice n theory but over time will pi@& you off. Stick with a mulch. Much easier.

as far as fixing your lawn, I've got nothing to offer. Sorry!
susanzone5 (NY)
9 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Do not use weed barrier cloth. It does not prevent weeds. They grow right through it and you will have a bigger problem in the end. No tiny gravel or stones either. Weeds grow through that, too, plus the soil gets mixed up with it and you have a chunky, hard to weed mess.

If you have that netting, I would hire a lawn guy to dig it all up, start from scratch with trucked in soil for veggie raised beds (no stone, no cloth or netting), newly planted grass seed at the right time for quick sprouting. Then weekly mowing of the grass to keep the tall weeds out. Short "weeds" are kind of nice to me. They add texture and tiny flowers. My opinion.
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Ihave Nonamé
Original Author
9 years ago
It was built in the 90s.

Thanks for the gravel tip. I actually despise most gravel - the unevenness while walking on it and the sound of the pieces rubbing together, the look of it, etc. I just wanted something like this:

Initially thought it was dirt but it apparently is a fine gravel... I wanted a pathway somewhat like this leading through the garden as well as having this down under the raised beds.
Ihave Nonamé
Original Author
9 years ago
I actually don't want a lawn...at all. I just want to grow some at the side of the house for the dog to use the restroom. I think the majority of the yard will indeed be covered in plants and mulched. But I wanted a path because walking on mulch just isn't as fun and thought this dirt/fine gravel path looked pretty.

I did read a tip that laying down cardboard/newspaper will block out the sun enough to kill out the weeds for a period. Maybe I could do this, lay some dirt/mulch down and plant? The cardboard/paper degrades in time but at this point, established plants should fight off some of the weeds for space.

My main problem currently is just getting rid of these tall, nasty weeds.
floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK
9 years ago
Any chance of a photograph to see what we're dealing with? Without more information my only suggestion would be never to skimp on ground preparation. Hurrying into building beds before perennial weeds have been dealt with thoroughly is false economy of time. It could be a months before the ground is ready for planting but it will be worth it in the long run.

The kind of path in your second picture is actually quite a big job to produce and maintain. It's not just a question of spreading gravel down. It needs some excavation, foundations and a specific type of material called hoggin, not just gravel. Constructing a hoggin path
Ihave Nonamé thanked floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK
User
9 years ago
The netting is what held the previous sod together. It lasts FOREVER. I'm still digging it up even though the lawn was sodded in the mid 1990s.