[Prophet in the wilderness]

There is landscaping material that you can use to keep weeds away.... land scaping professionals use it before they lay down mulch and plants.
You put this material down over the dirt, and you can cut holes in it and put the plants in the holes, water still gets to the plants, but, mostly keeps the weeds away. I heard you can keep bugs away with boric acid.

[Cindy]

Yes, we have used the fabric on some of the gardens.

[PalmettoMason]

There is landscaping material that you can use to keep weeds away.... land scaping professionals use it before they lay down mulch and plants. You put this material down over the dirt, and you can cut holes in it and put the plants in the holes, water still gets to the plants, but, mostly keeps the weeds away.

I wonder if this will work for me.

Last spring we moved into a house with a great garden spot. Our new neighbors raved about the great vegetables that the old couple we bought the house from used to grow. I decided to set out some tomatoes and peppers only, since we were pretty busy with getting settled.

The plants did GREAT, and it was a lot of fun until about midsummer... when vines started growing everywhere! They were worse than kudzu, and would grow so fast that I couldn't keep up with them. They took over my tomato and pepper plants and "strangled" them.

One of my neighbors stopped by one evening when I was out hoeing the garden, and mentioned that the old man who had owned the house before us had planted gourds his last year there. He said that the old man couldn't keep up with them either, and that the vines had taken over nearly the entire back yard and had grown up the trees surrounding the garden.

I guess these gourd vines will just keep coming back year after year until I figure out a way to deal with them. Your suggestion sounds like it might just help.

Thanks!