The previous owners thought it would be nifty to bury a layer of landscape fabric several inches below soil level. As Kim works on this neglected flower bed on the north side of our front yard, we keep discovering more. He gets to pull it all out while I water and deadhead and soak other beds for an upcoming weeding session.
I’ve run into the evil fabric… literally… with my shovel… all over the yard. I’m not a fan of weeds, but I’m also not a fan of weed fabric. No wonder I haven’t seen very many earthworms.
When I do resort to using the stuff on rare occasion, I put it on TOP of the soil, followed by a thick layer of bark. Burying the fabric did nothing to stop bermudagrass and other weeds from establishing quite nicely.
Weed block is the devil because it is almost always used incorrectly. I’ve had to fight it at all the gardens I’ve had over the years. Good news is once you get it out, it’s all gone. Good luck (and good riddance)!
Thanks, Katie. I just keep saying they were on crack. They had to have been…
That was the rage in the 1970’s. I remember putting down quite a bit of it when I was re-landscaping my mother’s backyard with rock and assorted drought tolerant plants. This would have been right around 1977 or 1978 — when the last big drought hit. But that was the rule of thumb back then. Put the block down (we used translucent sheeting, similar to what painters use today) and you don’t have to worry about weeds coming up in the rock. I must admit — it did work. But I’ve never seen it installed on grassy areas before.
Bill, the freaky thing is that the fabric is buried several inches below soil level. I’ve seen that done where there’s a French drain system (fabric, rocks, pipe), but everywhere I dig in the yard, I hit this stuff. It’s nuts. We are completely re-landscaping, thank goodness.