Gardener Story: Shauna Donovan
Spring is here and with it, another year of gardening! I have been itching to get out there and get some plants in the ground! With each new year, comes new techniques and changes to my garden. I always try to do something different each year so I can see what works well and what doesn’t. What’s nice about Build it Up, is I have support and advice that I can use to help me make decisions about what changes to make. This year, I’ve decided I want to figure out the best formula for weed control.
Last year, like every other year, everything started out great. The plants were in the ground and thriving and I was able to keep up with the weeds with no problem. However, each year around June, my garden is overtaken by weeds and I’m feeling overwhelmed and discouraged.
I noticed last year that weeds were pretty much a non-issue year round within my raised beds so this year, I added a few more raised beds (one of which is huge). A friend told me about a method where cardboard is put down and then a layer of soil on top and the plants are planted on top of the cardboard. I decided to try that for my peas. So far so good.
I am using the weed mat that was given out and burned holes in it so I plan to use that for everything else. I put straw around it to keep the plants from burning and to keep it from getting blown away by the wind. That makes three different methods that I’m trying for keeping the weeds at bay so here’s hoping one of them works well!