I know many would disagree with me, but I get a small hand sprayer and spray the stuff on a still day. Sometimes twice. Then I mulch - rotted leaves, composted horse manure from my barn, more mulch. I have heard newspapers do a good job then put mulch on top of that. Once I do that, then its easier to hand spray the few bits of grass, etc. that make it up thru the mulch. Am sure you will get many good suggestions but this works for me.
Judith

Hey, I KNOW where you are, lol! Grass is really hard to eradicate unless you poison or smother it. Even then you will fight it coming on the edges of your beds.

You have a couple of choices: keep pulling the grass as it comes through the mulch, which will require quite the effort but should eventually yield results,
-or-
place several (13?) layers of newsprint down on the bare soil everywhere there are no plants already, and cover it all back up with mulch. This will help significantly. Just make sure the newspaper doens;t still use highly toxic inks. Many already use soy inks are are only marginally yucky, and short-term.

Or you can Round-Up, being exceedingly careful not to get any on your plants.

Good luck, it might all turn out better than you think. Thick, thick mulch. I tille dunder some turf last fall, and mulched with a thick cardboard box our screen door came in, and a thick layer of cedar chips. The box took all winter to deteriorate, and there is NOTHING growing under it this Spring, lol!

alameda, sorry! cross-post!

If you grow lots of companion plants between your roses and mulch them too, there won't be a lot of room for grass to come through. We did this and in a few places where some stubborn clumps of grass were growing I placed some large tile pieces left over from a bathroom project and 1 foot square pavers over the grass. It killed the grass completely in a few weeks and the grass never came back. There was no reason to use poisons, which I wouldn't consider doing anyway.

Ingrid

If you leave black plastic on top of the area you want to kill the weeds for a few weeks, the hot sun will cook all the grassroots and seeds. You can cut holes in the plastic so there is plenty of room around the roses, and just anchor the ends of the plastic with rocks. Simple and it works. Done it before to kill off invasive chameleon plant (don't EVER buy it; it spreads like crazy).
-terry

Newspaper works well. Use about 4 sheets of it and make sure the edges overlap. Wet it down, and put mulch on top of it. It will last for about a year and eventually degrade. If you need to plant anything else in the bed just dig a hole through the newspaper and redo the newspaper around it when you're done.

I do this for my rose beds because I'm a horribly lazy gardener. In fact, I usually dig a hole in the grass, plant my rose, and newspaper around it. I still get some grass coming up but it's not that bad and I can just pull it. There's a spray called Grass be Gone by Ortho that is safe to use around roses, but it didn't work too well for me when I tried it last year. I'm trying it again this year but I haven't had a chance to use it yet.

Yeah, I would zap any grass shoots with Round Up. Unfortunately, a lot of work has already been done to make this new bed.

We have introduced several beds in the lawn, yeah, we are taking the lawn over, section by section. We have tried several methods. I do not mean to come on to you after the fact, but in case you do this again, we found the very easiest way was to spray the section you choose to make a bed with Round Up on the area, wait two weeks, then add your top soil, then voila! Works for us. Good luck with the unwanted grass. I do not think it will be really a big thing to get rid of it.
Good Luck RS.
Cheers!
Pauline - Vancouver Island.

Well i can't be much help as i planted my roses in the lawn and pasture. But the only soil that stays bare for any length of time is poison soil that i wouldn't dare plant anything in. If it isn't grass, it'll be weeds.

I have used newspaper under mulch in the past and ended up with bits of dried newspaper blowing around the yard. Brown paper grocery sacks are my preference now but if you had a source for brown cardboard (like appliance boxes) that would be good too. Grass clippings from mowing the lawn will work as mulch. If you have any autumn leaves left, add those in with the grass clippings.

Been there, done that...last year we decided to make a tomato patch in a previously bare area that had some kind of invasive ground cover growing in it. We thought we got it all (by picking it out by hand), but a week after carefully planting the tomatoes and putting the cages up, the ground cover came up with a vengence. so we had to remove all the tomatoes, spray with Round up, cover with paper, replant and then put down mulch.

I think Round up works only if the temps are high and the plant is exposed to the sun. So you may have to wait for the grass to come up if you want to use that. Or go with the newspaper/mulch method and hope for the best.

Next time, round up, let it die, then make the bed. We all learn the hard way.

I would not dare use round up in a bed with roses and other ornamentals. There is a product that can be used without problem, "Grass be gone" or grass killer is the name. I will try to locate the bottle to give you the active ingredient, because there are several products with this active ingredient.
I hope you excuse me for saying this but I refer to it as 'floozy' [:-( ] which is not the correct name but makes it easy to remember because the name of the active ingredient starts with a somewhat similar group of letters. It is available at Lowe's.

roundup doesn't work on some plants like ragweed. My north property line is a farmer's field that he uses ru to weed and since that little area is where he stages the grain trucks during harvest time he doesn't plant it, and too small an area to bring a mower to mow it. the ru has taken out everything except ragweed so the ragweed has no competition and grows as tall as small trees.

The "floozy" ingredient in grass killer is fluazifop. I have used grass b gone and other grass killers with very good success. I have had to use it on bermuda grass that kept invading my flower beds. It is not harmful to broadleaf foliage.
molly