Lasagna, no dig, weedless, gardening?

[warmfuzzies]

First post! I came over from BYC.

OK, I thought this sounded neat, has anyone else done it? From my understanding they are all pretty much the same thing. But I wondered if it worked, and if it is easier then tilling. I normally grow in beds anyway. Hubby thought it sounded harder to do lasagna gardening then to just till it

What do you guys think?

:rose I had to put the 'dancing flower for my DD.

 

[bid]

For me, it's a good way to claim some new gardening space. Of course my tiller is a shovel and a rake. It helps eliminate everything that wants to grow where I would like to grow something else. It's easier than tilling, at least the way I am doing it, but it's slower. Maybe try a spot you would like to claim for a new bed and see how you like it.

 

[simple life]

Thats funny, my kids hang over my shoulder looking for the smilies that dance and have me hit different ones. Tell her I sent her these :happy_flower :rainbow-sun row

 

[setter4]

I never really had a name for it but that is how I start new beds. Then I just keep adding to them each year till I get about 12" to 14" of soil. I do it out of self defense since our ground is soooo rocky! lol
:tools

 

[simple life]

I think its rockytopsis that had a great thread on her doing this last year. She had alot of success with putting down the cardboard and manure to prep her soil.

 

[momofdrew]

First post! I came over from BYC.

OK, I thought this sounded neat, has anyone else done it? From my understanding they are all pretty much the same thing. But I wondered if it worked, and if it is easier then tilling. I normally grow in beds anyway. Hubby thought it sounded harder to do lasagna gardening then to just till it

What do you guys think?

:rose I had to put the 'dancing flower for my DD.

I plan on making new raised beds in a new area this year and plan on layering cardboard last years chicken manure peat and compost is that what you would call lasagna gardening???

 

[luvarabhorses]

Hi, this is my first post, I came over from Backyard Chickens also!
I bought the Lasagna book and this is what I gleaned from it. Your bottom layer is meant to kill all the weeds etc already there so cardboard, I use horsefeed paper bags or news paper, is fine. If you use newspaper it needs to be a few sheets thick for this reason. Then you start your layers. I sort of modified this. I put the stuff at the bottom like straight horse manure and wood ashes, newspaper, then shreaded leaves and I topped it with my good composted soil in rows (I don't have much of it) mixed with a little peat moss to extend it and leaf mulch, less than perfect stuff in the areas surrounding the rows and then newspaper right up to the rows. I figure as the plants grow down into the soil the earthworms will have had time to get it going anyway.
My mistake this year was not covering my beds early enough to kill weeds seeds with some thick layers of newspaper (and covered by leaf mulch to keep it from blowing away). My rows have a few weeds popping up whereas my flower gardens (where I did it right) look terrific.
Real gardeners please feel free to comment on this- I am always looking to do things easier!

 

[patandchickens]

That's what I do for most beds, basically because while I enjoy weeding I could not possibly keep up with everything if I encouraged weeds to sprout (which is what tilling and not-mulching do).

How well it works to plant through a heavy mulch or through sheet compost depends on how bad your local vole problem is, IME.

It is GREAT for building good soil while minimizing the amount of weeds, though! So even if you find your ability to plant through it is limited, it is still excellent for starting new beds.

Pat