How Do You Plant A Garden With Landscape Fabric? Well, I’m going to show you! 🙂
Last year, as soon as I noticed The Duck Lady was using landscape fabric in her garden and that IT WAS WORKING, without hesitation I quickly ordered 2 rolls of the exact same landscaping fabric so I could do the same thing in our garden.
Monkey see monkey do, right?
A huge vegetable garden, with a magical fabric that retains moisture and heat with no weeds to pull all summer long? I was in!
Yesterday, with the help of The HH and The Girl, we spent a good part of the day laying landscape fabric down in about ⅓ of the garden and getting our tomatoes, pepper and potatoes planted.
{The potatoes are not being grown under landscape fabric, those are in a different area.}
Laying the landscape fabric down was pretty easy.
The HH would roll one section out, then I’d secure the left side and the middle of the fabric with landscaping staples.
Then he’d bring the roll back around again and roll out a second section, overlapping the lines on top of one another, and then I’d staple the two pieces together.
It was a little tedious, considering how big of a section we were doing, but all I kept thinking about was how nice it was going to be not to have to pull weeds. 🙂
Once the landscape fabric was in place, he used a torch to burn planting sized {about 5” round} holes in the fabric which prevented the edges of the planting holes from unraveling if you were to just cut holes in them.
Then The Girl and I started planting all the tomatoes and peppers. I had started the seeds under grow lights indoors about 6 weeks ago and this past week, finally hardened them off outside.
Let’s just say, it was nice to get all those plants out of the house.
I kind of went overboard on the seed starting this year, so it took a wee bit of time. Ha!
Okay, so it took a lot of time. 🙂
Like a few hours.
The final count was 53 pepper plants and 117 tomato plants.
Gee, I hope that’s going to be enough. 😉
~Mavis
P.S. In case you were wondering what I plan on doing with all these tomatoes and peppers come harvest time, the short answer is can them. 🙂
Here are a few of my favorite canning recipes to use up tomatoes and peppers.
- The BEST Salsa
- Canned Tomato Bruschetta
- Basil and Garlic Tomato Sauce
- Homemade Ketchup
- Sweet and Spicy Hot Sauce
- Jalapeno Pepper Jelly
- Pineapple Habanero Jelly
Looking for more canning recipes? I have a list of 93 canning recipes in seasonal order HERE.
Gardening season… It has begun! Yee-Haw.
Wendy C says
How were you able to dig a big enough hole for the tomatoes/peppers in the hole that he had blowtorched? We planted our tomatoes and peppers yesterday (very very late for us, but we are holding out hope :)).
Mavis Butterfield says
I just dug straight down with a regular garden trowel. You can see it in one of the photos.
Annette says
Seeing these pictures makes my back hurt.
Peg says
Using a torch to burn a planting hole is brilliant!
Linda says
I was going to say the same thing Peg did. I cut holes in the red plastic I put in my tomato beds last year, but then I had a measly 22 plants. What is the name of the fabric you used and will you use it anywhere else in your religious sized garden?
Mavis Butterfield says
Sun Belt. There is a link in the post. Yes. As soon as he gets the rest of the garden soil over to the other end, we will do the same thing again for the winter squash/ corn patch.
Tris says
Can you reuse the landscape fabric?
Mavis Butterfield says
Yes! That’s the best part. You pull it up at the end of the season. 🙂
Susie says
You planted those tomatoes six weeks ago? They are HUGE!!!! What’s your secret? At six weeks mine were little more than twigs (and honestly didn’t get much bigger – I should have switched their containers).
Mavis Butterfield says
I just plant them indoors under grow lights and switch them out to bigger containers {Solo cups} at around the 3-4 week mark. That’s it.
Christie says
This is fantastic! I like the burn technique. Do you have any concerns about the plastic leaching into the soil/plants? I was unsure for years about landscape fabric but am so tired of weeding, even with straw as mulch.
Mavis Butterfield says
I don’t have any concerns about the fabric.
Linda Boyd says
Great looking garden! How do you water everything? Do you have an irrigation system?
Mavis Butterfield says
We do not have an irrigation system. The last 2 summers we have only had to water a few times {with a hose and watering can}. Maine is kind of crazy that way.
Margo says
Will you be putting mulch over your landscape material to retain moisture? I’d be concerned it would fry everything during the heat of summer without it.
Mavis Butterfield says
Nope. The Duck Lady didn’t use mulch over her fabric. Once the plants get going, you won’t see the landscape fabric as much.
Sue says
I think this is a great idea but what do you do the fabric at the end of the season? Is it reusable? Has it got a lot of plastic in it?(not so good if it has to go to the landfill) Just curious.
Mavis Butterfield says
You roll up the fabric at the end of the season and store it for the following year.
Gail says
It’s great that you can reuse the landscape next year, but do you have any concerns about the holes and staples from this year?
Mavis Butterfield says
No. We will pull the staples up when we pull up the fabric in the fall and re-use those as well. As for the holes, I’m not worried as I’m sure I’ll be growing about the same about of vegetables for years to come.
Maxine says
What varieties are you growing?
Sue S. says
Yowza, what an undertaking
I’m impressed. I’m interested in the watering system too.
Not to use myself mind you. My watering system consists of emptying my 2 dehumidifiers every other day. Does this tell you I only have a few planters?
Mavis Butterfield says
As far as the watering system goes…The Duck Lady said she only had to water 3-4 times last summer because the landscape fabric holds the moisture/heat in that well. Fingers crossed I have the same luck because all I have is a 100 foot hose and a watering can. 🙂
Lainey says
I am so excited to see how this works and the tweaks to the system you discover. Weeds are the bane of my existence!
Linda Practical Parsimony says
I found that the plastic cover provided a great place for tomato horn worms to hide during the day. It took me a bit to figure that out. I only planted in pots, but the cover held in the moisture very well.
Amanda Clarice Kauer says
You need a cordless post hole auger to make the planting go faster. 😀
Pat says
We do the same thing. We use an auger bit on a drill to make the holes…saves a ton of time!