A Gardeners Forum Forums General Discussion The Food Garden Forum Clearing grass to start our new vegetable garden

Is there a more efficient way of clearing the grass than skimming the top 2-3" of earth to try to get most of the grass up? Or any tools that make it easier? We are just using a normal 'ole spade shovel (it's sharp) right now. We don't have time to do the "newspaper trick" (covering the area w/thick newspapers to kill the grass). We will not use chemicals, just plain 'ole hard work.

Thanks! Sarah

You can rent a sod cutter. It cuts off the top layer.

I did the spade shovel as well. it's alot of work but definately works well.

Or you can rent a rototiller, around here it's $40- a day. We're going through the same thing right now. We have access to some aged horse manure, so we're going to dump that on top, rent the tiller and till/mix at the same time.

I have to dig out grass from my garden every year it's mostly Bermuda grass.Every time I prepare the beds,the grass comes back even when I try to remove as many rhizomes as I can from the soil.

I use a ground cover in my veggie garden. It's a black plastic like woven material. Or, once your plants are in, put several layers of newspaper down then mulch or grass clippings on the top. If you keep several inches of mulch there shouldn't be much grass fighting you'll have to do.

I can't afford any and besides,the grass helps prevent soil erosion.

I don't care for ground cover in a veggie garden, you can't hoe up your veggies with it.

Enrique, just keep at it and over time you'll win the battle. I notice less weeds each year.

I have pretty large cut outs around my veggies, so I can still get at the plants. I still have to weed some but nothing like before. depending on the size of your garden that ground cover can get expensive! we came across ours for free otherwise I'd have never of used it.

In my opinion there is no alternative to getting the sod up. Rent a sod stripper or they are on sale at Menard's IIRC. It takes way long to kill grass with newspaper or covering of any kind and the roots may still be alive and difficult to plant in! Do yourself a favor and strip the grass off, then till.

Well, we're making headway w/the spade shovel. We're even getting the sod picked-up & to the curb for the yard waste guys to pick it up on Wednesdays. Once we have the sod up, we'll turn the dirt once. Then we'll add the manure & compost & turn again. During both additional turnings, we're always pulling up the plant stuff that's still there.

weed prevention: we're going to try putting down newspaper around the plants (instead of the black weed preventer cloth), like Cricket suggested. I had just heard about that idea from some gardening friends here in Columbus. The friends here put down soaker hoses before they put down the newspaper. We don't have those & the friends said to keep a nice amount of space around the plants & they should be just fine (or so they say).

I've been taking pictures of the progress & hopefully I'll be able to post them in the "gardening pictures" thread sometime soon.

Thanks for the ideas!

I'm removing more sod in order to make room for corn.