Prepare Beds NOW for Fall Planting

Prepare Beds NOW for Fall Planting Are you trying to build a new perennial bed where you once had some lawn Well let me show you the easiest way to do it and you should be doing it now in August so that you're ready to plant in September Once you have laid out your bed I want you to cut the lawn as short as you can and leave all the grass clippings to decompose and feed your soil Now we are going to try to smother the sunlight from the lawn so it dies in place I'm going to smother the sunlight from the lawn using brown cardboard, not the shiny glossy, colorful kind and take the tape and stickers off If you don't have cardboard you can substitute six sheets thick of newspaper I'm then going to put three inches deep of shredded hardwood on top of the cardboard So I've laid the cardboard out I've tried to overlap pieces as best that I can to try to keep the sunlight from getting through any holes that will allow grass to grow through We put at least three inches of wood mulch down on top That's going to do two things One, weigh down the cardboard so it doesn't blow away Number two, trap moisture and microbial activity against the cardboard to help it decompose so that it's going to be ready to plant it in in about a month If you're willing to come out here and keep this wet with the hose if it's dry near you um, that is going to help the cardboard decompose faster here in the middle of August I'm doing this now I'll be ready to plant it here at the end of September If you don't have paper and cardboard you don't want to go this route you could just use five inches deep of shredded hardwood mulch and that also could be arborist wood chips