Rjinga, Regardless of what you do to your area, that kudzu factory next to your property is going to be a pain until it is cleaned up. So, were this my property, my goal would to be to make my area so beautiful the owners of the kudzu factory would be shamed (hopefully) into doing something about their area. Until then the battle will be uphill but possible. Based on my experience with soil and weeds such as you are the proud owner of, I will answer your questions in this manner: 1. The weeds will always grow, that is not the focus. What we want is for the weeds to not grow in our planting beds and paths. The main benefit of lasagna beds it that the bed offers the best growing medium for our plants in such an area as you have now. Once the area is covered with the beds/mulch the new problem for the weeds is to find a way to grow through the barrier that now covers the weeds. Those weeds that make it through can be easily pulled regardless of when you actually plant in the beds. 2. I allow my plants to dictate when they need water, not on some imagined time schedule. I definitely would never overhead water that area, only the beds would get water by way of soaker hoses or some other drip watering system. IMO, compost alone does not provide enough nutrition for vegetables, thus I always feed my microbes extra nutrition to feed the vegetables. 3. Yes, you really do not need to remove the plants/weeds before making a lasagna bed. I would cut them down as low to the ground as possible before building the bed, however I would leave all the cut materials in place to add organic matter to the soil. Something fed those weeds/roots to make them grow, why remove that food only to have to replace it later? Trust me, you will need lots of leaves or other brown material to reach your goal. Again, the goal is not to get completely get rid of the weeds (impossible to do), but the lasagna beds and mulch will slow them down to such a rate of growth management will be a lot easier. With some types of weeds you have, yes, they will be eliminated as long as one doesnt get the bright idea to have the area plowed/tilled to stir up dormant weeds in the ground. And too, there can be weeds/seeds in the compost you acquire or the soil you have at the ready to spread later. The purpose of a lasagna bed and the use of mulch are to cover the soil with a layer of mulch so thick nothing will grow through it unless it is planted by the gardener. The lasagna bed will create a dynamic living organic growing platform that will allow maximum plant growth and a barrier for anything that is already within the soil below the bed. In a case such as yours to build a bed only twelve (12) inches or less is a waste of time, the weeds are too strong; a bed of at least twenty-two (22) inches or more is better insurance. The bed will shrink, but by that time most of the weeds will be dead below it. And too, the paths between the beds will have to be thick (at least four (4) inches to start), with more mulch at the ready if weeds grow through that barrier. The kudzu not on your property is out of your control, however, you can make sure there is no fertile ground for the kudzu to root; that is the purpose of the mulch. You are starting with very fertile soil, evident by the healthy growth of the plants (weeds) you now have. Adding organic matter in such a way as to allow one to choose what will grow is the ultimate goal. I trust what I have offered will help in some way Blutranes

Face it! Miracle Gro is just a commercial potting soil, albeit generally of reasonable quality. See one post above though for a demurral to that. The one thing that the Moisture Control product has, that others don't, is a measure of coir. That is, the fibrous outer husk of coconuts. And yes, coir does help significantly with moisture control. Be careful, however, as they do have another product with a similar name that has water-retaining crystals. If you like that, fine, just be sure of what you're getting. Moisture control! Now, what do we mean by that? The coir absorbs lots of water without becoming soggy and then releases it slowly as your plant uses it up. I've used it for several years as part of my repotting mix, to which I transfer young seedlings to grow until they are planted out. Using this mix allows me to water once a day without any worry that the medium will become waterlogged or dry out before the next day. I can do this right up until the plants are a foot high, a foot wide and drinking water like crazy. Then they have to be planted out. This is in a 32 oz. cup. I don't have any experience with container growing but I suspect that the same effect would occur in a larger volume as well. Your plants should do as well and maybe better. The principal difference, as far as I know, is that the coir is substituted for other materials, such as peat, vermiculite or perlite. It does hold and ration water better than peat and it has an advantage over vermiculite and perlite in that it is a natural plant material and will gradually break down and contribute to plant nutrition. There are other possibilities for accomplishing the same thing, though. For instance there are other coir products, some very expensive. Miracle Gro Moisture Control doesn't have very much. You could add more or make your own mix by getting blocks of ground coir and wetting them. These can be found at hydroponic dealers and are not very costly. A container-grown plant should do very well in a mixture of about 3/4 of good garden soil and 1/4 coir. That would also be a lot less expensive.

People sometimes wonder why I so strongly oppose the use of most of these unnecessary "weed" controls or killers and it is simply because we have around us 8 EPA superfund sites that are cleaning up after chemical companies dumped their waste and it has contaminated the groundwater. We were assured by the chemists that dumping that waste would not be a problem and what they did not say was that these chemicals they dumped mixed together, a synergistic effect, and created a much more dangerous chemical then either one was before, so now 50 years later the EPA is still pumping out the groundwater, filtering it to remove the contaminanats, and then sending it out at great expense to you and me. Every one that applies one or more of these poisons is poisoning the water I drink and potentially adversly affecting future generations. Keep in mind that all the water we have right now is all the water we will ever have, no more is being made and we recycle every bit of water. Any of the water you use has been recycled many times. Cosing your eyes or mind to that does not make it any less true.

Just tonight I opened a can of progresso french onion soup, and it looked so disappointing and sparse I decided to doctor it up. I thinly sliced an onion, and sauteed it in butter for about 15 minutes (not nearly enough to caramelize it) I then added some brandy (because I was out of madeira) and let it cook off, I added 1 1/2 tsp of better than bouillion beef base, another slug of brandy, and then 1/2 cup of water. I brought that to a boil, and added it to the simmering can of soup. The result was divided into two soup bowls, topped with a slice of honey wheat bread, and a pre-shredded mozerella/provolone mix that I happened to have. After three minutes under the broiler element in the microwave. Anne or Snidley's recipes both sound like they'd would be better, but for being made quickly from what was on hand, it was pretty good.