1. You can do it around shrubs, but just like mulch, give the shrub trunks 4-6" buffer, to prevent vole attack or rot. I find it better to do it around perennials, because they come back up in the spring right thru the extra inches. No danger of choking them. Hostas love it.

2. Unless you can find good commercial compost, I would use something else: cow manure (be careful not to get the Home Depot stuff that's 90% sand), horse manure from local stable, free used coffee grounds from Starbucks, etc. I have used grass clippings, cardboard, newspaper, fallen leaves, eggshells, vegetable table scraps & peels. You say you don't have compost, but if you put compostables in your lasagna layers, you will make compost!

Top with shredded hardwood mulch and your neighbors won't even know what you've got brewing underneathe.

Hey Abbie,
I'm not sure of the 'lasagna' method. I assume it's about layering, compost, soil, possibly newspaper?
Compost doesn't smell. It's decomposed plant debris that has not odor other than an earthy scent.
I have clay soil, too. I get soil conditioner from Lowes for $3.10/bag. It looks like chopped up mulch and helps break up the clay and improve drainage. I also add a lot of vermiculite, perlite, peat moss AND shredded paper. The paper will decompose as well as bring earthworms that seem to love paper. All these materials are intended to keep the clay from compacting and allow for easier rooting of plants as well as drainage/water retention. My other recommendation is to use a rototiller and till it all in if you have a large area you'll be working. I've had enough of shovel and fork turning and I want to get it all done....
Good luck,
Michael

Hi Abbie,
For the layers on top of your cardboard or newspaper you can use peat (no smell), shredded paper ("earthworm potato chips" - I get mine from the office), grass clippings, leaves, straw or hay, and all kinds of kitchen vegetable waste like potato peels, eggshells, coffee grounds. If you want to plant right away you can top it off with either bagged compost or soil - I've used both - and then a mulch like bark chips or whatever you desire. Half the time I just use more grass clippings on the top. It's SO easy and it works! :)

thank you all for the great ideas, especially the coffee grounds from coffee shops, soil conditioner, and the shredded paper from the office. i appreciate the tips, and certainly welcome any more!

thanks : D

Here's a link that might be helpful...happy gardening!

Here is a link that might be useful: Lasagna gardening info link

I use ground office paper, grass clippings, eggshells, coffee grounds, cardboard, newspaper, peanut shells, bean shells, etc as my layers for lasagna beds. As others have mentioned, just don't pile it high around the base of your existing bushes, taper it off (just one layer of cardboard with wood chips on top). If you can wait to plant again until the spring, all you need to do is put down the layers, water it, and put the wood chips on top. No turning, no work. In the spring, plant.

If you can't wait, put down a thick layer of newspaper or one layer of cardboard, put bought topsoil on top mixed with purchased compost, plant, and top with your hardwood mulch.

Here's a new bed I started this spring. For 2 or 3 weeks I put a plastic tarp over the area. I then cut a trench around the edges of the bed, layered with cardboard and compost from my compost pile, and topped with hardwood mulch.

{{gwi:585574}}

It does help to have a compost pile going year round. You can get a head start on your layers by gathering up the bags of leaves that folks leave at the curbside.

I too just moved to the area (last fall). I also have clay and no decent garden soil. I had a truck load of topsoil delivered with manure mixed in with it. You can get a small amount without getting a full truckload. It was easier than carring the bags and much nicer dirt. They mixed it with turkey manure and it was wonderful. Tell them you want soil for a garden not just a grass area. If you have any questions email me. You can get it from any company that hauls mulch, gravel or dirt. Good luck. This isn't good if you are only doing a small bed but I wanted to prepare the dirt area now instead of piece mealing each flowerbed one at a time.

Well, as always I'm late. I am in the process too of doing a "free garden". No money in it except for the mulch. I edged my garden where I wanted the edges, put the dirt and grass in the center of the garden and then raked it even over the garden area. I covered it with newspaper and some extra soil I hadn't used since spring and then mulched heavily. (Alright, busted, I am only half way done, LOL). All I have here is a bench and two winter planters. Simple, but good enough for the winter until I decide what I really want to do here. The good thing is that I'll have better soil next spring to plant in and all I had to dig was the outline and no moving dirt. Voila, garden area.

How right you are, hb. I cringe and want to stop people when I see them carting bag after bag of "topsoil" and "garden soil" out of Home Depot. Please stop! Pile up coffee grounds, shredded leaves, grass cliiping, shredded paper, and newspaper, and you will have wonderful soil, full of nutrients and worms. If you must buy something, buy bags of manure (without sand added) or soil conditioner. Buying those bags of "soil" that are actually mostly sand just makes me cry. I especially hate it that usually the folks are young, often with young children in tow, and can probably use the money better somewhere else other than worthless bags of "soil". OK, there's my rant (born partially becasue 10 years ago I was one of those young mothers who knew no better and wanted some nice flowers).

Call me old fashioned, but I still think tilling ammendments in is better. DON'T SHOOT ME!!! Lasagna gardening is certainly easier, and I'm not knocking it completely. But underneath this wonderful lasagna bed, the compacted clay or whatever you have still remains basically the same. In my experience the soil is not churned by worms as some people say, it's basically just a raised bed. GREAT for shallow rooted plants, annuals and veggies perhaps, but maybe not as good for deep rooted perennials. Now I don't have vast experience in trying them both out (and others may have a different experience) but when I dig in my lasagna beds, it's quite obvious when I hit the clay under my lasagna. I can't say for sure this bothers the plants, but it bothers me. Just thought I would offer a differing opinion. You may commence firing at me now :) -Ais.

Yes, keep adding amendments to your clay soil as described above. Also, I would encourage you to use a surfactant which will also help to break down clay. Simple to do. Buy a bottle of baby shampoo. Pour it full strength into your hose end sprayer, set the dial on 1 tablespoon per gallon and spray your garden soil with this once a month (all year long) for clay or compacted soils. Will not hurt foliage. There are commercial surfactants on the market but baby shampoo works just as well. Give it a try. And yes, during the growing season you can add liquid fertilizers or organic teas to the mix when spraying.

If you can, catch the episode of Smart Gardening (Oregon State university) that profiles a famous French organic garden. She describes the harm caused by altering (tilling) the soil's profile. I do not get hard clay inder my lasagna beds unless I dig deep. And a recent Scientific American article described how surfactants at 1 part per million cause deadly harm to amphibians. Sorry, I didn't used to be a nuts-and-fruits organic freak, but the more we all see our earth roll downhill, the more careful a job stewardship really appears.

Interesting, Brenda. I read Scientific American from cover to cover each month and somehow missed the reference of surfactants/amphibians. If true, then this will require the world to make major life style changes. Surfactants are soaps found in many things one touches every day. It will be back to brushing teeth with pure baking soda. No more washing clothes using any type of soap or detergent. Ditto washing hair. Many common commercial products contain surfactants. At the moment there are no laws banning surfactants. Perhaps there should be. Has anyone found detailed information on the subject?

Maybe the clay was just really compacted where I used the lasagna method. It was near the house where they had scraped away all the good stuff. Luckily most of my property has great soil so I just clear out the weeds, plant, and mulch. Mulching is definately key. After googling around for a few minutes it looks like some sites advocate no tilling, while others say not to till too deep or completely turn the soil. Since I don't own a tiller I completely turned the front bed with a shovel to mix in amendments, which it really needed despite topdressing for a few years. OOPS, guess that wasn't the best idea. On the other hand, the soil was much better after that and still is a couple of years later so maybe doing it the once wasn't so bad. Live and learn! -Ais.

You're right, Nan, surfactants are found in lots of products. Soap and detergents are all surfactants - it's actually the surfactant molecules that surround and float dirt/grease molecules away. Guess it also floats the frog's protective slime coat away. Not surprising really. One way the issue around amphibians surfaced was when commercial herbicide was used to kill invasive exotic plants in ponds. The amphibians died - but not because of the active herbicide ingredient, but from the 1ppm surfactant in the herbicide formulation. For this reason, many people would like to see unadulterated herbicides (without other ingredients like surfactants) available to regular folks like us. At this time, for big bucks, professionals can buy the active ingredient in bulk, but smaller, affordable quantities are not marketed.

No worry that toothpaste, shampoo, or any surfactants will be banned or limited - we don't ban the fossil fuels that are destroying the ozone layer, so what's a few frogs? In general, we ban things long, long after catastrophic results are obvious, and then we ban specific chemicals only when we have a method to detect that chemical - which is not trivial. Drinking water can legally contain like 2mg/L Total Organic Carbon, but virtually all the EPA monitors is volatile contaminants, which are testable in a GC (found in most labs), and make up typically around 0.2mg/L. So what are we drinking in the other 0.8mg/L? Mmmmmmm. And this attitude, my friends, is born not of a nuts-and-fruits birkinstok-wearing flower-child. It was born of too many years in a chem lab plus working with chemists at EPA labs 20 years ago, and finally standing in my own garden today, looking around and wondering what in the world we have done. I know there's harmful bacteria and fungi in the soil I play in, I eat fast food on occasion, and I know that loving strawberries means I injest a lot of pesticide, so i don't get carried away with all the dangers - if one thing doesn't kill us, another will, that's for sure. i just wish I weren't leaving such a mess for the kids to clean up. Want to get scared of your shampoo, look at the ingredients and then read http://www.ecsu.ctstateu.edu/depts/env_saf/msdspdf/sodium_dodecyl_sulfate_BP166100_Fisher.pdf#search='sodium%20lauryl%20sulfate%20msds'

Here is a link that might be useful: one article from many

Sorry for the rant, I was tired last night.

I'm with you Brenda.
Not a tree-hugger, but sure do love the little frogs, toads, and salamanders that frequent my garden. Have seen a decline in their populations as the use of pesticides has increased over the last 40 years, especially in FL where I used to live. It concerns me, so I use organic methods. No harm to the amphibians, no harm to the humans! :)What's not to like?

Surfectants allow for smaller quantities of herbicide/pesticides to be used. Surfectants actually are necessary to break the natural water tension so the mixture will blend with the water and attach to the surface sprayed. Without surfectants, products like Round-up tend to bounce off the leaves or run in droplets and most ends up on the soil where , until absorbed or evaporated, is a hazard to amphibians.

That said, I have never seen so many toads/frogs/lizards as I have this year.