Garden of Weeding

To date I have identified 4 ground cover weeds in our garden - this does not include the other kind of weeds...sigh.

The problem with the ground cover weeds is that they keep coming back - even in spots where we dug down over an inch! And weeding is becoming a problem as at 35 weeks the ground seems to be getting further and further away, so the weeds are growing where I cannot reach them.

Not to be outdone by weeds of all things, and refusing to go down in defeat. I decided to try an old trick used to kill grass - put down news paper!

So we carefully put down the newspaper.



Being certain to leave enough room around the fruit trees, plants and sprinklers. Then over top of that we spread compost, grass clippings and leaves.

We began this process a little over 5 weeks ago, and the weeds underneath are slowly dying as the newspaper suffocates them, but not our trees. Unfortunately some are growing out of the holes, but there are a lot less to deal with!

The newspaper is also acting like a mulch, so it is keeping things nice and moist in this heat, which is a nice benefit! Over time the newspaper will break down thanks to the sun, etc. In fact, we have already had to add more paper in some spots.

So the newspaper was part of our regular subscription - no addition money was spent. The water was part of our regular watering except for a bit the day we did the project, just enough to get the paper wet, and the whole project is chemical free.

That definitely sounds frugal to me! Head on over to Crystal's for Frugal Friday!