Mulching With Newspaper

Everyone has probably already done this, but it's a first for us.  I've been reading Ruth Stout's book, and listening to my friend rave about the method.  I've been saving our local paper all year, but had to go get more and still ran out.

This is the bed I was working on today, before and after the weeding last week.

The plan is to plant daisies in the location of that brown strip, with redtwig dogwood behind them.  Since the rototiller was handy I asked Richard to plow up that grass so I could get it smoothed out.  I put the wet  newspaper down in whole sections, overlapping the edges and then threw on some dirt to keep it in place while deciding on a more attractive mulch.

Koshka is checking out the new friable dirt!

The other job was in the curved beds at the bottom of the stairs.  The rocks were choked with weeds, grass and thistles so I dug them all free and weeded the bed.  It has not had mulch for years.  Bad decision. 

This bed was a real mess, with grass choked iris, and a few columbine.

Today's progress:

Soon, also,  I'll be working on lifting the iris and moving it to a sunnier location.  The iris were originally Richard's father's in Portland.

 I heard about vinegar as a weed killer and tried some, and the weeds turned brown within hours.  Therefore I ordered a 1 gallon pressure sprayer and brought home 3 gallons of vinegar!  I'll be working on the rest of the "driveway weeds" and we'll bring in another truckload of gravel.