Needing advice on where/how to transplant

[ShaydeyMyst]

I have started growing different types of peppers (lots of them), some herbs, and corn. Right now everything is growing in containers but theyre needing to be transplanted. I am going to plant the corn in the ground but for everything else, I'm not too sure about. The land isnt really ready for gardening this year so Id be having to deal with LOOOOOTS of weeds.

Would it be better to plant everything in larger containers or is there a way to get rid of the weeds pretty quickly and in a way that wouldnt harm my crops? Id prefer to not use chemicals. I'm mostly concerned about the peppers because they have deeper root systems and I'm not sure if theyd grow well in a container their whole life.

Any advice you have would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

[rainbowgardener]

The pepper would probably be ok in containers, 1 plant per good sized container, maybe 5 gallon bucket sized and the herbs will be fine in containers. Corn is not really a container plant. Needs a lot of room and a lot of plants together to pollinate each other.

Re the weeds. If you have a lot of garden space rent a tiller, till all the weeds under. Wait two weeks and do it again, then plant and mulch and you will have pretty well taken care of it. Otherwise if you want to plant now, lay down a thick layer of newspaper, water it til it's soggy. Put at least a couple inches if not more of good enriched topsoil on top of the newspaper and water again. Dig/cut holes through the soil and newspaper into the underlying soil and plant into the holes. The newspaper will smother the weeds and then it will eventually break down and disappear. I did this to turn part of my lawn in to flower beds and it worked like a charm, putting the newspaper on top of the grass.

[The Helpful Gardener]

First till, ONCE. More than once beats up your soil; I only till any garden one time ever, the first time. Buy a sheet of black plastic the size of your garden area or just a bit bigger, bury the edges under a shovel full of tilled earth the whole way around, and wait two weeks (maybe longer if it doesn't get hot outside). That kills every thing INCLUDING seeds near the surface. THEN plant. If you can't wait then acetic acid (like vinegar) will burn off the tops of the weeds, but won't kill roots. I don't like Round-Up for a lot of reasons, but you should never use chems around food IMO.

Rainbow's newspaper does work, but as soon as you till, you bring up old weed seed (like crabgrass, that stays viable up to six feet under for up to a century . Better to till then kill...

HG

[IndorBonsai]

These are great ideas,
I wish I would have joined the forums before I cleared a 16'x16' area for my garden using a shovel. Removing the top layer(about 2 inches) of grass and dirt takes along time and is hard work:(

[The Helpful Gardener]

It's the right way to do it, indor; just added an 8X25' area to the garden myself this spring with my trusty spade. I think turfing out grass is the only good way to do it...

HG

[Jewell]

Last year I started a vegetable garden in a new area that had been allowed to go to grass and weeds. I used to double dig all my new beds, but had a surplus of cardboard during the previous fall/winter and decided to lay it out on my preplanned beds. I kept adding organic matter (only clean weed/seed free trimmings) until late spring when I started planting. The cardboard had decomposed and there was a huge number of worms . I poked the holes in the cardboard and organic matter and had the easiest garden ever. I couldn't believe how the ground was so loose and easily worked.

Later I read some articles on "lasagne gardening", and "no-till gardening" on the Internet. This is definitely the only way I want to garden. I don't know if it would work for everyone, but it certainly worked extremely well in my garden. I have had no or very few weeds. Those that I do have are along the edges of the beds and easily pulled.

I have since started using shredded paper on my flower beds for mulch. It seems to be a worm magnet and the worm castings are great for the garden.

[ShaydeyMyst]

Thanks for all the suggestions! I really appreciate it!

[The Helpful Gardener]

Paper and cardboard is a high carbon source that helps out our fungal side of the biology, which is usually what is low in most soils I see, so there is definitely a plus there. The worms are definitely drawn to paper; I have seen it in worm bins dozens of times...

No till allows the fungal structures to develop, where repeated tilling breaks them up and destroys them. They both loosen and aggregate sooil at the same time, provide a food source for worms and such, and really gets soil more towards the chemistry our veggies will like, so Jewels plan works as well.

Really all the plans here work; just consider which you can actually make work fast (Rainbow's is fastest) and which will do the best for the biology (Jewell' plan). Mine is a hybrid of the two with some speed and some biology retention built in, and as a hybrid plan, probably not the best of the bunch. If you are steering towards organic culture then Jewell's plan is better than mine, and if you are going to use chemical fertilizers, then RG's plan is better than mine. Mine is likely the lamest plan, for those who just can't commit either way

HG