[CARROTTCRUNCHER]

Hi we only took on our allotment in july 2008 we only have thirty plots or so altogether the local farmer gave us this ground as he never used it , He ploughed it nice and deep then power harrowed it for us , Then we levaled it out we then built our raised beds on top of the fresh ploughed ground then i put some cardboard in the beds two layers thick and then i toped them up with some more top soil and cow muck and left till now, I have dug them over to let the frost break it all down . the reason i put cardboard in was to suppress the weeds as before it was ploughed the ground had alot docks and grass,we left it for the rest of the summer and i think the cardbourd has done the trick we have had no weeds come through . We intend to use some weed supresent membrain on some of the beds were some plants will be happy to grow through it ,Again the reason for this is to stop weeds as i have heard the longer you shut the light out the weeds will just die and leave us with nice clean beds in the future. I would really like to hear all your veiws on this as to weather you think this is a good method .

[penance]

Do you mean placing a membrane on top of the soil and cutting slits for plants to grow through?

I personally wouldn't bother. I just hoe regulary, this helps to remove weeds and stops the soil surface capping. Capping is when the surface hardens and dries, making it harder for water to soak in to the soil.

Another method you could try is to use a compost mulch, around an inch deep, any weeds the start to grow are easy to pull out and you can dig in the compost over winter helping the soil structure.

[CARROTTCRUNCHER]

Yes thats what i was going to do cut slits in but now you have just mentioned about the mulch compost i think i will do that, we have just been to town and i have just bought 250ltrs of peat compost for £10 . thats 99 pence for 25 ltrs . Thanks for the advice would still like to hear from anyone else if they have any other ideas.

[poppies]

Hi we started off just like you on farm land, not been used for years, we also had it ploughed and harrowed, we did'nt want to use chemicals so we covered it up - but any bit of light and the weeds just grow through it, also like penance said it capps the ground,and encourages slugs and in our case voles, the best way in my opinion is to just leave it open and hoe   or dig out any weeds, dock seeds seem to stay in the ground for years we still get the odd one  4 years later


for the really bad bits we put the pigs on  - that did the trick

also if you want to grow potatoes on ground that was grass you might get trouble with wireworm our first year the potatoes were riddled with them  but last year we did'nt find one.

[sunshineband]

We've just made raised beds on a section of a playing field - rough dug the soil in the base and left it for now to let the frost get to the lumps. Hoping this will kill off a lot of the pests/let the birds eat some of them.

Going to fill a couple next week and cover them with polythene to help gry it off a bit and warm things up so that I caan get some onion sets in. Just planning to put the spuds in near the bottom and fill up as they grow.

Fingers crossed we are not under a foot of snow again!!!
D'you think the weeds will grow up through a foot of soil?

[Ice]

D'you think the weeds will grow up through a foot of soil?

I believe that some of them would grow through a foot of concrete.

[sunshineband]

Blimey!!! I have got mainly daisies, dandelions and grass, with the odd thistle... are these all going to such Bs to deal with?