Hi there,

I'm not all that qualified to answer your questions, I consider myself an amateur at the veggie garden and have no experience with planting in what used to be a lawn. But I am interested in seeing the answers you receive.

It would help if you post your zone or rough location to help others determine appropriate planting times, etc....Sorry if I missed it somewhere.

Danielle

I have a garden the size of your second smaller area. We had bermuda as well and lots of weeds. This is what we did. We placed thick newspaper down on all of our beds and then placed 3-6 inches of compost on top. I don't think this is as practical since you have much more space.

For your garden I would use the skid steer and remove as much grass as possible. I would then till this area as deep as possible.

A few things that we did with our garden was we found a horse farm and obtained lots of composted manure enough to add 6 inches to most of the area. Also we had a tree service dump a truckload of wood chips for our use. We covered the area with the wood chips to help with weed control.

I would also suggest that cardboard can be your friend. While I have not battled lawn grass, I have fought very thick field weeds as well as woodland thorny vines when clearing for new beds. In my opinion big sections of cardboard are much easier and faster than layering newspaper, although that also works well for weed suppression.

Since you're wanting to plant immediately this may or may not be of help but cardboard is a plentiful resource....just look around Walmart, Lowes or any large store that routinely restocks inventory. You'll often see broken down boxes in shopping carts as employees restock shelves. So far I've never been turned down when I ask, they're usually more than happy for you to take them away. They're just going to compact them in a big bailer for recycling/trash. The bigger the box the better....more coverage with less effort.

If I were to go strictly the chemical route, it would be extremely costly to spray all of those large healthy weeds probably a number of times to completely kill them. So I just hack any obnoxiously large specimens down to around ground level but don't bother with any that can be easily compressed down like grasses. Then just lay a mat of overlapping broken down cardboard boxes so the plants can't see the light of day. Wet the boxes down and then cover them with a blanket of mulch or even more dirt. You can build up your bed right over top of this....the weeds will mostly be choked out and the cardboard will eventually decopose. For the first growing Spring/Summer I would do a walk through once a week and if any tenacious field weeds did manage to break through I'd squirt em' with a little shot of weed killer but it wasn't many. Once you're confident the previous weeds were history you can rake back the mulch if it hasn't all broken down and use it to mulch whatever you plant there or lay it in other beds.

I saw a tree cutting service operating on fallen trees after some storms rolled through a few years back so I stopped and asked them what they do with the wood chips. They usually had to drive to a place in a neighboring town 20 miles away to dump them so they were more than happy to bring me the load when they were done for the day, which is what I used to cover my cardboard at the time. You might call around your town to tree removal services and inquire.

Good luck with your project!

"Organic isn't as important as having manageable weeds, healthy plants, and balance of labor/cost for results."

In my experience (comparing my garden to neighbors' gardens), organic is what will give you healthy plants, and therefore many fewer pest and disease problems, and therefore a much more successful garden. I'd say hold the Roundup! You've got such awesome organic materials on hand, they can be used to give your garden a great start.

I've used (in different sections) both tilling and Ruth Stout method to start, and then enlarge my garden from solid lawn. You could always till up part of the area (so the work of it wouldn't be too daunting) and then do the rest the layering way, either solarizing first, or using cardboard beneath the layers as suggested above. To solarize first, start by wetting it down and laying down clear plastic in early summer to catch the longest days of the year, and then add your layers of mulch and manure. I suggest this because the areas of my garden where I never tilled have been the most free of weeds, so if you could do part of the area that way you may end up with fewer weeds overall. Or you could start now with the layered areas, using your cardboard and other materials, and it will be ready for mid summer planting of fall crops, which will make you very happy when the summer crops are winding down and you're still eating from the garden. Of course, knowing your planting zone would help in making these recommendations.

One advantage to doing it in sections is that you start with a smaller planting area, and as you learn and grow (no pun intended) as a gardener, your garden will grow (in size) along with you, and that may help prevent the "overwhelm" that can happen with a big garden.

Wishing you a great growing year!

I agree that sections are the way to go.

Throwing away your sod is throwing out a whole lot of organic matter. But sod is the very devil to kill - unless you are wanting a lawn, in which case it promptly dies.

One thing to keep in mind is that a lot of methods, such as RoundUp, smothering, aren't going to work when the grass is dormant. It has to be actively growing, and that's when you want your crops to be actively growing.

Agree that it would be a big help if we at least knew your gardening zone. That alone will determine much of the "timing" in what you do not to mention the information we can provide.

Dave

Sorry about that. We are in Zone 5 (now 6 according to new rules) and we live in Eastern Oregon. We'd like to plant the cooler crops in April (usually DH like to get potatoes in spring break even) and we usually plant things like tomatoes and peppers mid May.

We shared a HUGE garden with friends these past few years it was about 80' by 100' and we learned a lot about how much to grow to support our family in winter. Before that we gardened for years and years on only about 20x20 area and planted as much as possible in all the flowerbeds in our town lot. We've just never put in a new garden this size before.;) We can always learn new things even if we think we know some of it already:) We've only lived on this acreage about 7 months (a hard earned dream come true!)

I have done the remove the lawn with a rented sod cutter method and can recommend it. All the surface weed seeds will be removed with the sod so you really get a clean slate to start out with.

I's good that you have access to a loader because sod is HEAVY! I put the sod on the side (growing side down) and it turned into a beautiful soil amendment in a couple of years.

I've read that RoundUp is short lived and not harmful, but I've also read that the products it breaks down into are harmful. So I will not use it in any area that will have veggies.

Removing the sod method also lets you get an earlier start. As soon as the ground is dry you can start removing the sod and tilling. Since RoundUp only works on actively growing plants, you have to wait for the grass to to come out of dormancy and grow for it to work. RoundUp does not kill seeds, so you have to wait for weed/grass seeds to germinate and start growing and reapply to kill them. Then wait for the RoundUp to be safely gone before you start tilling.

It is awesome to have such a large amount of rotted straw and aged manure right from the start. That will balance your taking away the organic value of the sod. And you can put that organic sod layer right back on after the sod composts!

Good luck and keep us posted!

Good news, hubby can just peel off the sod with the skid steer we have at the house with no rental fees. So we decided to go ahead and peel off the sod, avoid Round Up, till it up to start, and start adding mulch heavily from here on out.:) We decided that for us it is probably best, with our time-frame and needing to get things planted that was our best bet. I am excited to have a plan! Thank you for all your help!!

A lot depend on what type of grass you are removing. If it's something like Kentucky blue, removal is easier. With bermuda or St. Augustine, you have runners under the soil that can be a problem in the future. Potterhead's solution will work well for either, but for grass with runners, you should wait a while for leftover roots to sprout and then repeat the process or spray with Roundup. Solarization is another way to kill grass, but it takes a long time and will delay the start of your garden.

I would recommend plowing it with a moldboard plow and disk the first season, then you can roto-till from then on.

So what size lawn tractor is that? Our John Deere riding mower isn't probably that powerful. I'd have to look and see if they have those at our local rental shop.

That is the other option, bringing in more serious tractor implements and doing it that way, it's just close to the house and would be hard to maneuver around. We do have a friend that wants to do the same with his field and we could split a rental day between the two families if we went that route.

I guess I figured after we got the sod off we'd rototill everything to loosen it up, then we could always double dig just the row areas for deer crops like potatoes, carrots etc. We are not opposed to hand digging areas (hubby has always double dug the entire 20x20 area each spring, we never rototilled.) I just can't picture digging much more than a couple areas for deeper crops.:)

In the walkways we might not even rototill we were just going to use cardboard and some tree trimming chips we got when the tree trimmers were in the area.

We went out and measured everything out this morning and used upside down marking paint to mark the areas out. That was fun. Feels like the plans are taking shape even though we have a long way to go.:)

First what zone are you in. Second, Turn everything under. The grass is full of nitrogen. Determine what type of soil you have. For the area size you have. I would contact my county extension service for several soil testing kits. Based on what you want to plant. You would need to know your PH since there are plants that like acid soil,blueberries and neutral soil PH of 7.0 or less tomatoes, eggplants, greens and such Take quite a few soil samples based on what you are planning to grow. before adding any soil amendments do the testing so you have a baseline to start with. once you have the soil test results. You can amend the soil as needed. In most cases you will need lime to raise your PH or sulfur to lower it.
Pine needle are acidic as is peat moss. If your soil is clay I add sand to the soil. Sand is little shards of stone which cuts the clay as it moves during hot and cold weather. I could go on but you get the message. it is a big initial undertaking but worth the effort. Look out for critters. Rule of thumb 1/3 for nature, 1/3 for the animals and /3 for you.

I am glad you are scraping off the grass! I have done the tilling in grass thing before and regretted it. I agree that an area that large isn't for lasagna planting but I love that you want to do it and not Roundup! I hate Monsanto!
All that mulch will be great. I am organic but still use lots of plastic mulch for transplant/heat loving crops so I can handle a dry, sandy 1/2 acre, super weedy garden by myself. I had the field disced the begin with but it was already a field with cover crop not a lawn. Now I have permanent beds and plastic mulched paths and do very little tilling. I use a weed torch to kill the surface weeds without bringing up more weed seeds.
Good luck!

I will be starting a similar sized garden this year with double the size next year. The site I have used to have a chicken house on it for years and the grass grows like crazy there. I will take a tiller attachment with a tractor and till it in a few times to kill the grass then start to plant. I figure it will take a couple years to get it where I want it though. I also have access to all the composted cow manure I want just a few miles down the road at an auction barn. I will haul in a few trailer loads of it and till it into the soil as well. I figure I will have plenty of fertilizer that way.

I have been planting in lawn (we bought an additional 1/3 acre from our neighbor) by just mowing on the lowest setting of my lawnmower, which pretty much scalps the grass, then digging a hole with a post hole digger for a tomato, then I mulch right up to the tomato with two layers of cardboard and at least 4 inches of fresh grass clippings. It works great! The grass dies and the weeds can't make it through the mulch. I just have regular lawn grass, none of that crazy creeping Texas stuff I hear about. The soil in areas I have done this is extra fabulous the next year.

I suggest pulling out the stops in terms of soil improvement for two years, then going to perpetual wood chip mulch. Lay out permanent beds (level rather than raised), add organic matter every chance you get, fertilize crops appropriately before planting with an organic fertilizer, and sow back-to-back cover crops in areas with perennial weeds or other issues. In two years you will be able to tell a big diff, and your soil will be biologically active. Wood chips have very few weed seeds, and make a great perpetual mulch in permanent pathways and improved beds.Plus they are free.

We know that most of our straw supply is certified weed free. Some of it is not certified so I expect some weeds. I plan to use the certified stuff around the fruit trees, strawberries, blueberries (well basically any perennial crop to keep weeds down better). The rest we will take our chances with or use it in the horse stalls first. Since with the manure we expect seeds from the hay etc and we can compost it for a while.

Any recommendations on organic fertilizers (that won't break the bank for a garden that large?) We have used fish fertilizer some but generally we always go too light on the fertilizers (haven't been unhappy with our gardens though). We used to use Miracle Grow but didn't ever notice much improvement from it.

I think we have about 10 yards of tree trimming mulch but i don't know when we will be able to get more. The tree trimmers were in the area at the time.....we live so rural it wouldn't be likely we could get them to deliver for free again.:(

We have a bark mulch plant nearby that we could get a load of bark for $40/yard but they way overload your trailer for what you pay for....so it probably works out to something like $30/yard. We were planning to use that more in the finished landscape areas of the yard (flowerbeds, mounded landscape areas etc).

About cover crops...I have always been interested in this. What are some recommended crops? I figured we'd plant something this fall when the other crops died down...is there something that will sprout/grow some before the next fall...how do you get rid of the cover crop without tilling it under etc?

I love learning about all the ways to have a successful garden and I appreciate all the feedback!

Little_minnie~ I like the way you chose to plant and mulch! I'll bet it works great. We might try that in a smaller scale to see how well it works for us.:) Dh still wants to peel off the grass layer but we do have a tighter area that the equipment would be hard to get to, we might try it there.:) Thanks for sharing.

A soil test will help determine fertilizer. My field is excessive in P, Ca and Mg and high in K, so I just use manures and a N only fish emuslion. But I wouldn't know without a test.

Cover crops depend on your zone. I like putting in a legume cover crop that is not winter hardy (non dormant alfalfa or crimson clover) and then in spring plants can be planted into it without tilling. Otherwise rye and vetch together are great and mid summer buckwheat is good if mowed before it goes to seed. Cold hardy legumes like winter peas are good in early spring and late fall.

If you decide to use cardboard, ask at the grocery store for empty melon boxes. They fit on a pallet for shipping melons in and are 2-3 times thicker than regular cardboard boxes. Everytime a store orders melons they come in these pallet sized box so they are usually happy to get rid of them.

A fair amount of your organic matter may currently be in the grass/weeds (depending upon the depth and quality of your topsoil). Ideally you'd plow and disk the area, leave it for a few weeks and redisk. Possilbly again if you have problem weeds/grasses. If done at the right time of year, 2-3 diskings or tillings will kill most of the currently growing plants, at least enough to make it manageable for a garden (afterall you will be weeding during the season).

In our area, it is fairly easy to find people with heavy duty tillers and/or small tractors to prepare a garden area in the spring. Since prep like this is something you only do once, it is usually much more cost effective to hire someone with the right machines to do the work. As well as being much easier on your back ;-).

If it isn't too wet and the ground is frost free, you might be able to get started on this soon. It should be before the big spring crunch for most of these people, and would give you time to get several disk/till cycles in before planting.

Greenpea is correct.

If you can, try and find a farmer who has a small two to three bottom farm plough.
One can still find them around here but I have learned that in too many areas the farmer no long keep them for small things.

I just hit the cardboard motherload today at Home Depot....they just unboxed all the new Spring Lawn Mowers and had it all neatly stacked in the back. There was a pick-up truck load worth of it! Just a tip to be on the lookout at stores that sell big yard equipment....now's the time of year they'll probably be getting in new models. That had never occurred to me before.

How do you certify straw is weed free? lol I had to ask. That is an oxymoron, mulching with straw will bring upon weeds (because straw is/was WHEAT!!!) because a combine can't certify it got every last seed head!