I just harvested my first spinach from the garden last night for supper - I just went thru the patch and cut off the largest leaves, leaving the rest. I couldn't separate out the tiny plants from the batch of mesclun greens I started indoors so I ended up planting them in bunches so I have tons of plants all tightly packed together. I'm going to wait until each "clump" will give me enough for a decent salad, then shear them off and leave the stubs and see what grows back. I might pull a few of the plants at the same time to give them more room to spread. They are packed in those clumps pretty tight! I planted them last year (just scattered the seed) but I was only growing it for my daughter's pet rabbit. When I saw how easy it was to grow tho, I decided to plant some for myself this year. From now on tho, I'm just direct sowing. The direct sowed stuff is larger than the stuff I started indoors and I didn't have to fuss over it, watering and turning lights on and off! Has anyone ever scattered seed over their bed before putting it to sleep for the winter? I was thinking since lettuces and spinach can take the cold and wet and be planted so early, maybe I can prepare their area in fall, scatter the seed and just leave it to sprout in the spring? Lisa

Tom, "John, are you using the white bags? I'd be concerned about the dyes and chemicals in the other colors.... " Good point. Heres what they (Greenbag Inc) say... "Is made from non-toxic, non-corrosive materials and safe color-fast dyes". I'm interested in these for several reasons, drainage, cooling and cost. I know they drain well, I don't think you could ever fill one with a garden hose. The upside down tomato bag I tried last spring stayed cool and it was black. The ones from Publix are a buck and I hear W mart's are cheaper. So I'll give it a try. john

Not to worry Mari. As others have said tilling is not necessarily needed. My tiller was never effective in this rocky, hard clay and usually just bounced all over creation so I stopped trying. I've been doing exactly what you did for the last two years with great results. I'm slowly reclaiming what I thought were impossible areas just by putting down a couple of layers of cardboard right overtop of thriving weeds and making sure it overlaps properly to prevent sunlight from penetrating. Then I cover that with a thick layer of mulch/dirt, etc... (heck, sometimes I don't even mulch if it's an area that isn't easily visible and won't be an eyesore. If there are already established plants in the area I just cardboard around them and pull whatever weeds may reach out around their bases. Otherwise I just wait until the weeds are dead before planting new things. Even if a few stray weeds or runners find a way through it's much easier to eliminate those few once all the rest are dead. I had an area that was completely taken over by wild blackberry vines taller than me. They spread 15 feet closer to the house in just one season! So I whacked everything to the ground and then blanketed with the cardboard in the summer and everything underneath is dead now(yay!) I have yet to find a chemical brush or weed killer that actually does what it's supposed to and kill the root of the annoying weed grasses, thorny vines, etc... This takes a little longer but will not waste your money or time like spraying. I also just borrowed a large rubber liner from a relative and I'm going to use that to try and retake my gravel driveway and parking area one section at a time. I have heard this "solarization" is not always recommended for areas where you intend to plant though because the heat will also kill the beneficial microbes & organisms that are in that soil. Weeds in gravel are an awful pain. I look forward to a day when we can afford to blacktop it. Sincerely, Danielle

Newbies are generally the legit posters who add to old threads like this (though I've occasionally had one where I missed the date, myself). And perhaps scared away when they get jumped on. The spammers usually haven't read the other posts and are off target, and have outside links, or merchandise recommendations. I wait for the actual spam to judge. Everybody has to have a first post somewhere. But Sushipup has a good point. I haven't seen it, but maybe the trick is to add outside info later. Like maybe MT is shilling new packaging, Anyway, in answer to your question, I was just trying to point out the potentially innocent ways old threads get revived. We all know the self serving versions.