well - if your going to go to the trouble of doing a little clean up first, plant some re-seeders. red russian kale and radishes grow like invasive weeds in my garden. lettuce is a good one too - leting just one lettuce go to seed produces thousands of seeds. alternately - if you want to set and forget till the little ones are older and life more settled: winter rye grass is something you could plant as a cover crop that totally dies each year. Another scheme would be to use this area for deciduous leaves in the fall. take from the neighbors even - especially the first year. Just keep piling them up - they can and will smother anything if they get thick enough - 2 feet deep will be 4-6 inches next spring/summer, and eventually down to just 2 inch, then pile on the next years. and in 2-3 or more years when you go to plant, your soil will be excellent. maybe rake over 1-2 times if some weed are poking through....or not - as the next year's leaves will like wipe them out. Enjoy those babies!

bsmith - having looked at some more literature, I've softened my stance on both triclopyr and fluroxypyr a good bit. I think it would be fine to use your grass clippings with a few caveats - these are my views on how to manage the risk to an extremely low and what I would consider acceptable level: 1. I wouldn't collect any grass clippings until after 4 mowing of treated grass. 2. The composting should go through a good thermophilic phase reaching at least 135 ðF for 5 days. 3. The compost needs to be fully cured and mature before applying it to soil. With those steps I would have no reservation about compost made with those clippings, provided that the herbicides were used as directed on the labels (i.e., no excesses, etc.).

By the time the clippings have composted all winter, will the compost be okay to use next spring? Nobody really knows. Seems lots of people use chem treated clippings with no noticeable ill effects, but... who knows? I used to use a chem company for my lawn. Then my 7 year old golden retriever died from cancer. One tumor pushed her eyeball out and the rest filled her lungs and throat to the point she suffocated to death and collapsed. She ate lots of grass. I looked up the chems being used and found that one of them was rated as virtually non toxic to all animals it was tested on *except* dogs. In dogs it caused cancer. Nice. I fired the chem company and wouldn't even consider using chemical treated grass anywhere on my property. To me it isn't worth the loss of peace of mind.

First most all of the bad chemicals have been banned so I doubt you have anything to fear because with rain most of what they used would dissapate, but I am not certain if they dropped some on your leafy plants but I would cut back just to be safe. Since it is their fence they have every right to access it on your property, but then many people are inconsiderate of others needs. A knock on your door would have been the right approach. Here is a link that might be useful: Propagating Perennials