For most home gardeners and people with flowerbeds, one of the least favorite tasks is weeding. Let’s face it, pulling or digging weeds is a tiring job and few people like doing it if it can be avoided. There is an amazingly simple and inexpensive way to minimize the weeding, though, and it isn’t harmful to the environment. It isn’t necessary to buy ‘weed-guard’ fabric. In fact, the material used in this method is usually free and if anything is purchased, it is usually for cosmetic reasons. What is this amazing method? Simply put, it is the use of cardboard. Here is how it works. Let’s say that you want to put in a two-foot weed-free zone along a flower bed, or alternately between rows of vegetables in the garden. The purpose would be to prevent the need of pulling weeds in that area. The first step would be to get some cardboard boxes. The boxes should be collapsed and if there is tape on the boxes, it should be removed. The next step is to cut the weeds and/or grass close to the ground. This can be done with a mower or line trimmer. It isn’t necessary to pull weeds or grass before using this method, just cut the weeds and grass short. A double layer of the cardboard is then laid down in the area where you don’t want weeds to grow. Since cardboard isn’t one of the most aesthetically pleasing looking substance, the cardboard can be covered with straw, bark mulch, wood chips, or similar biodegradable material, or even a shallow layer of dirt. Once this is finished, water the area well. That is the whole method, believe it or not. It really is simple, isn’t it? What happens is this. Cardboard is made from wood pulp. It absorbs water and breaks down naturally, usually over the course of a year or so. While it is breaking down, it provides a barrier that plants can’t easily grow through. The plants, deprived of sunlight, die over time. Yet, since the cardboard absorbs water and allows air to pass through, it doesn’t harm the rows of vegetables or flowers that are growing nearby. 
This method can be repeated as necessary if you want to continue preventing plants from growing in the area. If you don’t want to continue preventing plants from growing in the weed-free zone, simply allow the cardboard to compost. This adds to the health of the soil. The reason that any tape is removed before laying down the cardboard is that tape doesn’t break down easily like cardboard does. Different sizes of boxes can be used, too, making it simple to vary the width. If you wish, you can cut the cardboard for irregular shapes and this method can even be used around trees and bushes. More than one layer of cardboard can be used, too, depending on how resilient the grass and weeds are that you are blocking. It isn’t unattractive if the cardboard is covered with mulch, either, and any weed seeds that germinate on top of the cardboard can easily be removed without hard pulling or digging. Some people might even use a shallow layer of dirt on top of the cardboard instead of mulch, as previously mentioned. I love to garden, but I’m all for anything that makes the task simpler. Cardboard boxes are usually free, too, and by using them, you are helping the environment while preventing the cardboard from taking up space in landfills and garbage dumps. There is initial effort to set all of this up, but it ends up saving a great deal of time and effort in weeding.
Creating Ultra-Low Cost Weed-Free Zones in the Yard and Garden
Rex Trulove
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27 Comments
“This can be done with a mower or line trimmer. It isn’t necessary to pull weeds or grass before using this method, just cut the weeds and grass short.”
Did you use lawn mower to clean the grass? Was it fun?
I wouldn’t call it fun, but both here and at church, I used a gas powered mower until it broke down a few weeks ago. I need to get another. I do use a line trimmer/weed eater both at home and at church and with the mower not working, I use it a lot more now. Otherwise, the grass and weeds grow tall and become quite unattractive. They also become a fire hazard as they dry out if they aren’t kept cut.
Very ideal for weed control. Ours we use weedicide or herbicide to control the growing of weeds.
The problem with herbicides is that the harmful chemicals stay in the soil for years, they can kill animals as well as plants, and that they inevitably end up in the water supply. That is why I sometimes put out extra effort to have the least bad impact on the environment that I can. In this case, though, it actually saves effort while having very little negative impact.
I need to apply this method, I have veggies growing in the middle of a nice grass lawn, or so you would think!
Believe me, I know the feeling! In our case, it is mostly bindweed, though there is also crabgrass.
Rex, this is an awesome share! My dad used to have his gardens laid out like this to reduce weeding. Really well done! Thanks for sharing this!
It is by far one of the easiest ways to save time and effort in gardening. It also helps the environment, so it is a win-win.
That was my dad’s gardening rules (that and produce amazing tomatoes).
I’ve used the same method around my tomatoes. It is necessary to do something like that because of the amount of bindweed/wild morning glory that we have growing here. That stuff will twist around almost anything, including tomato plants. When my tomatoes get to about four feet tall and about the same diameter for the bush, it becomes problematic to get to any bindweed that is growing near the main stem. The cardboard takes care of that issue.
It really does. My dad also used to lay out the paths with gravel so it was easier to get wheelbarrows and other things into the garden area. At one point he had nearly 3 acres of garden. Plus another 4 acres of apple orchard. It was quite an impressive hobby farm!
He may never have gotten all the way there, but at least he made the attempt. Many people have dreams of trying something noble but never move beyond the dreaming stage. Dreaming is easy. Doing is not so much so. LOL
It really does sound impressive. I don’t think I could handle a garden that large.
It really was, my father was a science professor at Indiana University, he wanted to have a sustainable farm. We were on the way, but never actually got all the way there.
Good method to adopt , really helpful
The best part is that once the cardboard is covered, it can’t even be seen, so all a person sees is a nice, neat border where there are no grass or weeds. It looks like you have spent hours per week pulling weeds when you actually didn’t spend any time at all getting rid of them.
interesting and nice post..
I did this with old newspapers one year and it worked fine. This may actually be a good way to use the cardboard that I keep getting in the mail. Just for curiosity’s sake, Did Virily’s software make any changes in the formatting of your post, such as running paragraphs together?
It appears to have done so. I’m going to need to get in the habit of saving a draft and previewing it before posting, though there is no guarantee that the loss of formatting didn’t happen during the posting part of the sequence.
Sometimes I have to preview several times to make it come out right, and then I hold my breath and hope the final version will be right. No guarantees of that though.
I’m getting used to it, each time there is a major update. It will gradually get better. My photo gallery that I posted yesterday had no problems at all.
Maybe I’ll try posting again soon.
I’m thinking about using this method in the future. Good to know, thank you for this information.
It is surprising how well this works. This year, it has cut a huge amount of effort out of my gardening.
Excellent information, thank you.
My neighbor uses newspaper and cardboard and has beautiful gardens.
It is an excellent method for people who don’t like weeding. lol