The Garden is 'IN'

Mother's Day has past so now it time to be planting the vegetable garden.  At least that is the tradition for many.  This year we had to days with frost warnings immediately after Mom's Day.  But now the weather is on an apparent warming trend.

In early March I laid out the beds for my new garden using techniques described in Weedless Gardening by Lee Reich.  The goal was to avoid having to till the new garden and remove all the grass and weeds.  The result has not been entirely weedless, but the amount of buried vegetation coming through has been manageable.  I think if I had waited until the grass had begun to grow and use up some of the energy stored in the roots there may have been few 'weeds' poking through.  More of the buried vegetation is working it way up along the seams between the cardboard and paper layers.  So for now I am just pulling off the tops of the grass and weeds to keep them from generating any new energy.

The fences are up and the garden is ready for planting.
Pollinator plants will go in along the outer fenceline.

The second phase of establishing the garden was to put up the fencing to keep the wildlife out.  My biggest concern is the deer, but there are plenty of other varmints (rabbits and ground hogs) to deal with as well.  I got a copy of Deerproofing Your Yard and Garden by Rhonda Hart.  I found this a very useful book that explains how deer operate and how manage them.

Separation between the fences is 3 ft, however 4 feet is commonly recommended.
Note the new compost enclosure in the back left, made from old wooden pallets
(Idea thanks to Washington County Master Gardeners).

The method I am trying out is a hybrid of the double-row fence and the invisible monofilament fence. The idea behind the double row fence is that while deer can jump high or long, they can't do both.  So a 4 foot fence that is also 4 feet deep is an effective deterrence. The invisible monofilament fence works by surprising deer with a barrier that they can not see.  In my case I had the remains of an electric fence to use to make my outer monofilament fence (I used the leftover electric fence wire).  I have 4 wires spaced out between 1 and 5 feet off of the ground.  For the inner barrier I have a very visible chicken wire fence.  The main purpose of the inner fence is to keep out the smaller mammals.  The chicken wire is partially buried under the mulch (flaring outward) to discourage tunneling into the garden (we'll see if that is enough).

The fencing was immediately effective.  The Sunchokes, Helianthus tuberosa, I planted a month ago had been repeatedly browsed upon, but after the fence was up they started getting taller.  About a week after putting up the fences a deer did breech the fence and it appeared to be a messy result for the deer, judging by the amount of fur left behind on the chicken wire.  I'm hoping that that was a learning experience and that it was sufficiently unpleasant.

Seeds for Peas, Collards, Chard and Lettuce sprouted within a week
and the Tomato and Pepper plants went in yesterday (5/15).

In the Deerproofing book the point is made to put up your deer deterrents before there is something to attract the deer.  So now that I've had the fence up for a couple of weeks I've started putting out the vegetables.

This year I am planning the garden based on companion planting ideas.  The plants in each of the 4 rows should all get along.  Here's whats going in:
Row 1:  Winter Squash, Snap Peas, Chard and Collards with Winter Savory
Row 2:  Pole Beans, Lettuce, Zucchini, Corn Salad and Arugula* with Nasturtums
Row 3:  Sunchokes, Tomatoes, Basil and Lettuce with Marigolds
Row 4:  Tomatoes, Peppers, Shallots and Garlic with more Nasturtums

*Arugula is in the cabbage family and may not be a good companion for the pole beans.  I should be harvesting these while young, so they may not interfere with the beans as they mature.

I'll plant the bean and squash seeds in a week or two (when the soil gets a little warmer and I should have the pollinator border plants by the end of May.

More Maryland Wildflowers - 2nd Week of April

Deciding which native plant to use in a developed suburban landscape was fairly straightforward for me.  I could choose the plants I wanted without regard for to how it would impact the surrounding plant communities.  [Re]-introduction of nearly any native species into a sea of Euonymus and Barberries and the like would be a step in the right direction.

Now that I am working in a rural landscape I am becoming more sensitive to how my new plantings will affect the existing plant and animal communities.  I am cautious about introducing species that don't belong, native or not.  One very helpful resource for me is Native Plants for Wildlife Habitat and Conservation Landscaping Chesapeake Bay Watershed from the US Fish and Wildlife Service.  This publication lists many native species found in the Chesapeake watershed including their native ecoregion (Mountain, Piedmont or Coastal) and state where each is found.  

As a designer I also want to insert some visual effects with form and color.  This may require broadening the plant palette, drawing in materials from other areas and even a few well behaved non-native plants to achieve a particular aesthetic effect.  In general I will utilize a wider variety of plants in the immediate vicinity of a house or other man-made feature.  As I move out to the edges of a property I narrow the plant selection to the regionally native species.  I try to avoid introducing any species that don't naturally belong there.  

So before I get too far in planning and planting new native gardens I need to do some surveys of what is already present.  This (finally) brings me to the topic of what I found growing during the second week of April.  The tree canopy was still pretty open and the woodland floor was really greening up.




The first thing that really hit me was the masses of Virginia Bluebells that were coming into bloom.  These started coming up about a month ago.  Some had purple tinged foliage that has since turned green.



I was very pleased to see large masses of Mayapples coming up, especially I had just bought a half dozen to plant along the driveway.  These look somewhat alien when they first break ground.  They have a large white flower that stays just under the leaf.  

Mayapple leaves open up like umbrellas, 6-8 inches across.  

Once leafed out Spicebush can still be identified by the spicy scent of its bark.

The number of Spring Beauties has finally peaked,
now the blooms remain only in the shadier spots.
Note the garlic mustard off to the right.

Spicebush was another plant that I had just purchased to add to driveway area.  I was very happy to see a large mass of these growing near the creek.  The little flower clusters add an ethereal yellow haze to the scene.  These are not as garish as the Forsythia that are also in full bloom at this time.  






The Spring Beauties, Claytonia virginica, are continuing to come out - now the ground is sprinkled with the pale pink blooms.  The Dutchman's Breeches, Dicentra cucullaria, have also come into fuller bloom.  Some are white and others have a yellowish cast.  

Flowers started out a pale green
before opening up and turning white.

In with the Dutchman's Breeches is a plant with similar finely divided foliage, but this one had tubular yellow flowers.  It turns out that this is Yellow Fumewort, Corydalis flavula.  This native annual is 4-12 inches tall and has glaucous green foliage similar to other Corydalis.  I had never seen this before and was suspicious that it may some of the non-native Yellow Corydalis (C. lutea) that escaped from a garden.  The distinguishing feature from other yellow Corydalis (C. aurea and lutea) is that the upper lip of the flower is toothed.  This species is rare in New England, but not uncommon further south and west.

This winter annual was probably among the
early foliage seen back in January

The upper lip of the flower is toothed.  Also,
 seed pods are visible just below the flower on the left.

Should be getting some yellow flowers from these Trout Lilies in a couple of weeks.
If they are white, then these would be White Trout Lily, E. albidum.

Down in the leaf litter I noticed the spotted leaves of Trout Lily, Erythronium.  No blooms or buds were evident at this time, so I will need to get back down to these is a week or so to catch them in bloom.  As I was climbing back up away from the stream I noticed that the Toothwort were finally in bloom.  The dangling white flowers are not spectacular on their own, but they complement the other ephemerals. The Woodland Phlox, Phlox divaricata, are putting up flower buds, but I did not see any in bloom.  Back up on the lawn I am seeing Common Blue Violet, Viola papilionacea, complemented by the yellow flowers of Rough Cinquefoil, Potentilla norvegica.  Oops, these are actually the non-native Indian Strawberry, Duchesnea indica, see the comments below.

Each flower stalk of these toothworts has a pair
of deeply tri-lobed leaves, hence the epithet  'diphylla'.

Woodland Phlox has formed it flower buds.  Opps, this is actually Cardamine laciniata.

Common Blue Violet has hairless flower stalks,
otherwise this could be Woolly Blue Violet, V. sororia.

Unlike other weedy Cinquifoils, Rough Cinquifoil has
trilobed leaves and relatively large blunt-tipped flowers.  However, this is actually
Indian Strawberry, Duchesnea indica. with larger flowers than the Cinquifoil
and later a red berry.

Along with all of these natives there is a large population of garlic mustard that are beginning to bloom now.  Removing these will be a long and tedious process.  I have put a supply of black trash bags around the property to collect these.  In areas where the soil is moist it is possible to get most of the root out by gently pulling the plant by its crown.  Garlic mustard has a lot of stored energy in its root and may be able to set seed even though it has been pulled out of the ground.  A good practice is to bag them up and let them bake in the sun for a while before sending them to the landfill.  Garlic mustard should not be put into your compost. However, it is edible and you can make a decent pesto from it.

Spring Wildflowers: Texas vs Maryland

Two weeds ago we made a trip to Texas to visit family.  The end of March is the beginning of Texas wildflower season.  We flew into Austin then drove up to the Ft. Worth area.  You could see that Austin was really coming into bloom.  As we drove northward along I-35 the number of Bluebonnents along the highway dropped off considerably.

Even at 75 mph you can appreciate Texas Bluebonnets

One thing about seeing wildflowers in Texas is that they come in big patches.  Much of this is due to the efforts of Lady Bird Johnson with the Texas Highway Department to create and preserve wildflower habitats along the highways.

View of Courtyard at the Wildflower Center in Austin, TX

When we got back down to Austin we paid a visit to the Wildflower Center.  Here we saw many of the wildflowers we saw along the highways, but this time with handy name tags.

Texas Bluebonnets at low speed.

There are about 50 species and subspecies of
Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja).  I don't know
them well enough to tell them apart.

I've been looking for seeds for Groundsel.  This looks like it would be a nice addition
to a low-growing meadow/lawn alternative.  It has bright yellow flowers in spring
emanating from a basal rosette of leaves.

This Blackfoot Daisy is found on dry well drained soils.
I was interested in growing this plant, but the Northeast
does not provide the best conditions.

This little Prairie Verbena was all by itself, but it is known to
grow in large swaths, turning the ground purple. 

The narrow bronzy-green leaves of this Spring Beauty
blend into the leaf litter.

On our return to Maryland, the landscape was just beginning to turn from brown to spring green.  However, there were no massive swaths of color as we had witnessed the day before.  Inspired by all those Texas flowers I took a walk through the woods and found a few subtle surprises.  There were little pinkish white flowers along the edge of the woods.  These turned out to be Spring Beauties, Claytonia virginica.  This ephemeral perennial blooms in early spring, then essentially disappears after setting seed.



Further into the woods I found the masses of Toothwort continuing to expand.  The buds still have not opened, but they are nearly ready.

It's early April and these Toothwort are nearly ready to bloom.

The latest find was masses of finely cut foliage indicative of the genus Dicentra.  I searched around for a while and found one clump with developing flowers.  I'm pretty sure that these are D. cucullaria, Dutchman's Breeches.  I will keep a watch out for other family members, like Squirrel Corn (D. canadensis) and Wild Bleeding Heart (D. eximia).  These are most easily distinguished by the shapes and colors of their flowers.

When the flowers of Dutchman's Breeches are fully developed
they look somewhat like upside down pantaloons.

  

 I'm not keeping score, but the spring wildflowers in Texas are a grand sight to behold, but when the early summer temperatures creep into the 100's they will disappear.  In the Northeast the ephemerals will also slowly fade from view, but this will be due to the developing shade of the woodland canopy rather than the heat and dryness.  No matter where you live you've got to get out and appreciate that winter is coming to an end.

Putting in the Garden

Turf in garden area 'weed whacked' to less than 1/2 inch tall.

As I mentioned a few posts back, I am putting in a new vegetable garden over an area that was previously 'lawn'.  I am using a technique described in Lee Reich's 'Weedless Gardening', where soil disturbance is minimized, by working from the top down.  This method uses a layer of grass smothering material to kill the existing vegetation and then a layer of soil or mulch on top of that layer to do the planting in.  By not turning over the soil, no new weed seeds are brought to the surface and the original soil structure is preserved.  (This method may not work so well on compacted soil or where there are some major soil chemistry problems.)


The first step in this process was to do a soil test to learn if there were any serious deficiencies or pH problems.  Turns out that the pH was good (6.9) and the nutrient levels were about right, save for a low phosphorous level.  Step two was to cut the existing vegetation down as low as possible.  I did this with the weed whacker.  Where there were vigorous clumps of grass I really scalped them down to the ground.

After flattening the cut vegetation, apply a fertilizer at a rate of 6 cups of a 5% nitrogen fertilizer for every 100 sq feet.  I had some Espoma Organic Lawn fertilizer with 17% Nitrogen (17-0-3), so doing the math, I only needed 2 cups of this per 100 sq. feet.  The soil test results indicated that I needed 1/4 phosphorous per 100 sq feet, so I was able to formulate that in with some triple phosphate that I had on hand.  Since over use of phosphorous in fertilizers is a major contributor to water pollution, having a soil test done and using only the required amount of phosphorous was the responsible way to go.

Now comes the new trick.  Rather than tilling the new garden, you just cover the garden space with cardboard or four layers of newspaper.  This will starve the existing vegetation of light and prevent germination of new weeds.  Since we had plenty of boxes and packing paper from our recent move, we were in great shape for this.  I chose to use paper to cover over the areas that would be the new planting beds, and cardboard for the paths since it would take longer to break down.

Cardboard was laid out for the paths.  Landscape staples held it in place.
My new Weed Wrench was handy for holding down the stack of packing paper.

After getting the paper and cardboard down on the ground with the help of some landscape staples, the paper was wetted to get it to conform to the ground.  The beds were covered with a layer of soil, and the paths were covered with a couple of inches of mulch.  This installation would have been easier on a calm day, however it was kind of blustery the day I was working.  The stables really came in handy to hold things down until I could lay down the initial layers of soil.

The planting beds in this garden are 3 feet wide and 12 feet long.  The width was chosen so the entire row could be easily accessed from the path.  By not stepping on the planting beds soil compaction is minimized and good soil structure is preserved (and no digging!).

I had 3 yards of screened top soil/leaf compost blend delivered...

and carted it down to the garden to build up the planting beds.

Now I just needed to make a 'few' trips to move the soil onto the new beds.  It would have been much easier if I could have had the soil delivered closer to the new garden, but alas that did not work out.  So about 16 trips with the wheelbarrow later, I brought down enough soil to cover the beds 3-4 inches deep.

In addition to the vegetable beds I am also preparing perimeter beds where I will put in some pollinator friendly natives.  These include Aquilegia canadensis, Asclepias tuberosa, Monarda fistulosa and Rudbeckia hirta and R. triloba.  These plants are also listed as deer resistant.  As such they are serving as part of my multi-layer deer defense scheme.  In addition to these deer resistant plants, I will plant some of the annual False Pennyroyal, Hedeoma pulegioides.  This is not listed as a deer deterrent, but it packs a pretty sharp minty odor when touched.  I'll watch to see how the deer treat this plant.

Again, I used paper under the perimeter beds, so that root penetration will be easier.

You may have noticed the double set of fence posts.  The outer set are from an electric fence that the previous owners had used for some sort of corral.  The inner set will be for a plastic mesh netting fence that will be partially buried.  That should keep out the rabbits and ground hogs.  The double fence method is supposed to deter the deer because they are not able to judge the width of the double fence and will be uncertain about making a safe landing on the other side.  I'm not planning on turning on the juice to the electric fence unless I have to.

The main beds and paths are all done.
Just need to prep the back edge for planting the Pennyroyal.

The final step was to cover the cardboard paths with a layer of mulch.  We had this on hand from some trees that we had taken down last fall.  The mulch will hold down the cardboard and suppress weed growth from both above and below.

It's really strange to be working in the garden in early March.  Back in Boston I wouldn't come out to the garden until late April.  I wanted to get an early start putting this garden in so that the layers of paper had a chance to suppress the old vegetation and then begin breaking down to let the roots of the new plants through.  Once the fencing goes up in a couple of weeks I will do an update.

More Winter Trees

Since it is still a little early to start creating the beds for the vegetable garden I've had time to take a closer look at some of the trees out back.  With the leaf buds beginning to swell there is enough information on the twigs to do some identification.  Our new property is blessed with a number of hickory trees.  In my last post I showed a photo of the terminal bud of a Mockernut Hickory (Carya alba).  This past week I found that there were at least two other species of hickories.

The Pignut has smaller leaf scars than the Mockernut.

The first one I noticed had a much more ovate terminal bud than the Mockernut Hickory, and the leaf scars were more like a rounded off equilateral triangle.  Again, I turned to Trees of New York State for help in narrowing down the choices.  Based on the detailed descriptions in the text I feel pretty confident that this one is a Pignut Hickory, Carya glabra.

Not far from the Pignut was another type of hickory.  The leaf scars on this one were triangular with raised edges.  What stands out is the bright yellow buds and the orangy color of the year old twigs.  This one was easy to find in the key since only Bitternut Hickory, Carya cordiformis, has the yellow leaf buds.

Yellow leaf buds and the raised leaf scars indicate that this is a Bitternut Hickory

As I was taking these photos I noticed some branches where the leaf buds were opposite on another on the twig, rather than on alternate sides moving along the twig.  There are only 6 genera of native trees with this opposite branching:  Maples, Ash, Catalpa, Buckeye, Dogwood and Viburnum.  When I see this opposite branching pattern I usually think of maples, but the terminal leaf buds on this branch were not as pronounced as on maples.  To help with this ID challenge I turned to The Tree Identification Book, by George Symonds.  A quick review of the twig photos brought me to this being some type of Ash tree.  I'm pretty sure that this is a White Ash, Fraxinus americana.  I settled on that because the twigs were smooth and not fuzzy (F. pensylvanica); and the leaf scars are concave at the top rather than straight across (F. nigra).

White Ash has smooth, hairless twigs, a blunt terminal bud and the leaf scars are concave at the top (arrow).

 An easy tree to identify in the field is the American Beech, Fagus grandifolia.  In this photo you can see the elongated leaf buds.  Other indicators over the winter are the persistent dried leaves and the smooth gray bark.

Leaf buds of the American Beech 'stick out'.

Looking down at the ground level I had been perplexed by a small leafy plant that was just sprouting up last fall.  I was unfamiliar with it and just assumed that it was badly confused by the warm weather.  As I was deciding on plants to order for this spring I came across a description of a spring ephemeral that matched up with this little plant.  This appears to be Toothwort, Dentaria diphylla.  I will need to keep an eye out for the little 4-petaled white flowers this spring.  I only found one patch, but I hope I have some others.

Toothwort, a spring ephemeral is a member of the Mustard (Brassicacae) Family.

While walking back to the house I noticed a lot of little white flowers blooming in the lawn.  Many aspects of this plant were familiar, but I could not put a name to it.  I ended up digging one up for closer examination with a hand lens.  The flowers had 4 petals so I immediately thought of the mustard family.  I ended up using Gleason and Conquist to key it out as Cardamine hirsuta, Hairy Bittercress.  This is an Old World plant that is now found in 2/3 of the US.  It is a winter annual that germinates in the fall and overwinters as a rosette.  It blooms from early spring and through the summer.  While edible, the leaves on mine are very small, so it would take a lot if picking to make a salad.

Hairy Bittercress has tiny hairs on the leaves and petioles visible with a hand lens.

Early Spring???

This winter has been schizophrenic.  Bouts of snow followed by brief warm-ups.  Last Tuesday, January 29th, it was well over 60 degrees here in Washington County, MD.  We have had Snow Drops, Galanthus nevalis, blooming since Christmas day but I had seen no signs of pollinators.  That is until the 29th when the little flowers were being swarmed by honey bees.

How many bees do you see here?  I counted 6.

Can someone ID these bees for me?

I assume these are European Honey bees from a local hive, but to be honest I don't know that much about bee ID.  I was surprised to see so many bees out this time of year.  I only hope they have someplace warm to return to as the temperatures dipped back below freezing two days later.

"Buds naked, rusty-brown-tomentose; bundle scars 5-7"

While I was out photographing the Snow Drops I decided to see if there were any other early signs of spring.  Walking through the woods I found no early blooms, but I did see some swelling leaf buds.  I noticed that the terminal buds of the PawPaw Trees, Asimina triloba, were getting pliable.  While I remembered their location from the fall, I just wanted to double check the ID using a plant manual.  I needed to do the ID based on the twigs and bark.  On Google Books I found a very nice resource for identifying trees in the Northeast US: Trees of New York State .  It has several identification keys based on leaves, flowers and fruits, as well as one that focuses on the appearance of twigs and leaf scars.  There are also detailed descriptions of each of the tree species.  The description in the key confirmed that this was one of the PawPaw trees.

This image close-up shows the 5 bundle
scars where a leaf had been attached.

Looking at things like bundle scars can be very useful in identifying trees, especially in winter when there not much else to go on.  The bundle scars are left over from where the vascular bundles of the twig and leaf meet.

Encouraged by my success with the PawPaw I found another tree with distinctive leaf and bundle scars.  On this tree the leaf scars were large and 3-lobed, almost like a stylized human skull.  The bundle scars were clustered in arcs, one cluster in each lobe.  Using the key I was able to narrow it down to a Hickory (Carya) of some sort.  I needed to go to the detailed descriptions and accompanying botanical drawings to finally settle on Mockernut Hickory, Carya alba (formerly C. tomentosa).

"Twigs very stout pale lenticellate pubescent reddish brown turning gray the second season.
Leaf scars inversely 3 lobed, the bundle scars in marginal clusters.
Terminal bud reddish brown or yellowish usually tomentose 1/3 to 3/4 of an inch long."  [from "Trees of New York"] 

There are plenty more trees to identify in the woods here, so I should put on my boots and get out there to see what I can learn before the leaves start popping out.

Starting a New Vegetable Garden

When we moved into our home in Watertown, MA starting a garden was easy.  The previous owner had established raised beds in a sunny opening in the back and along the south-side of the house.  The beds were small, but the soil was great.  Over the next 17 years the sunny spot in the back became only partly sunny (maybe 4-6 hours of full sun) due to the trees growing up and out.  Now with our new property in Maryland we are starting with a clean slate.  There are no established kitchen garden beds, so we need to determine which space works the best for us.

In selecting the site for the garden we considered accessibility to the garden, water, exposure, soil quality and protection from wildlife.  I consider solar exposure and soil quality as the most important factors; those are the most difficult to change.  All the convenient locations near the kitchen have less than optimal solar exposure.  A location off the garage offers better protection from wildlife, but it impinges on the septic field and is surrounded by trees (too much shade).

Garden site looking to the NNW.  Parts of the electric fence can be seen

The site I am considering with now is fairly open, with evergreens to the north and only a couple of trees nearby.  It has an open south-east aspect (the topography tilts to the SE), so it should warm-up quickly in the mornings and have good light throughout the day.  There is a water faucet nearby and the previous owners had installed an electric fence around the area, so we have the beginnings of an enclosure to keep the deer out.  I just need to take some soil samples for analysis to learn about any problems with the soil chemistry (crazy pH or nutrient deficiencies).

In addition to a deer fence I will surround the immediate area of the garden with a low mesh fence dug 6" into the ground to discourage the rabbits and ground hogs.  I have ordered a quantity of False Pennyroyal seeds (Hedeoma pulegioides) to plant on the perimeter.  The strongly aromatic scent is reported to repel many animals; we'll see just how effective it is.  Some other deer resistant plants planned for the perimeter are: Aquilegia canadensis, Asclepias tuberosa, Monarda fistulosa and Rudbeckia hirta.  These plants should also help in attracting pollinators.

Since I am planting a garden from scratch, I spent a little time reading about companion planting in order to make some better decisions about which plants will benefit from interplanting in the same part of the bed.  Two books that I found useful for this are "Companion Planting," by Bob Flowerdew and "Little House in the Suburbs," by Deanna Caswell and Daisy Siskin.  I can not speak about the benefits of companion planting yet, but these books did offer some explanation for some of my past vegetable garden failures such as Kohlrabi with Pole Beans and Snap Peas with Tomatoes.

Since I am interested in growing Native Edibles as well as 'regular' vegetables, I have ordered some tubers of Jerusalem Artichoke, Helianthus tuberosa, known as a Sunchoke in culinary circles.  These can get out of control on their own, so we will need to harvest the tubers annually to keep them in check.

I have also ordered some tubers of Groundnut, Apios americana.  They can be used like potatoes, but have a nutty flavor.  These sprawling vines may find their home along the shady woodland edge, rather than the center of the garden, for both cultural as well as aesthetic reasons.

To prepare the planting beds I will be using techniques described in Lee Reich's book "Weedless Gardening."  This is a top down method where the existing plants are cut to the ground then covered with multiple layers of paper.  NO DIGGING!  After wetting the paper it is covered with several inches of weed-free material.  In my case this will be soil that I will plant seed directly into.  For the garden paths I will use cardboard cover with wood mulch as a more resistant barrier layer.  The existing plants are smothered and since the soil was not turned over no new weeds from the seed bank are brought to the surface.  I will refer you to this easy reading book to get the details.

I've seen this technique work successfully for converting lawns to ground cover beds.  This will be the first time I've tried it over a more robust planting.  Since we still have loads of paper and cardboard left over from our move this is a perfect way to use existing resources.  The only materials I will need to bring on site are a couple of yards of planting soil and some organic fertilizer.  The best part of this method is that I will not need to turn over a large mass of the soil, only to be followed by a long season of weeding.

I will update this information as the garden installation moves along.