Basic garden advice needed!

[Raven]

I have a raised bed garden that's approximately 25'x25'. It has excellent soil but the weeds are going to be the death of of me. This year I thought I would till it, put down that black plastic stuff, cover the whole thing with wood chips and cut openings in the plastic where I want to plant. Will this work? Any problems with doing this? Any advice would be much appreciated!

[WolverineDG]

1. I covered mine with newspaper

then dumped more soil on top of that. when planting seedlings, I make sure that I pierce the newspaper layer a bit so the roots can spread out. It's working well so far.

dg

[bvar22]

2. I would stay away from the black plastic.

Did you say 25 feet by 25 feet ?!!!
That is one BIG raised bed!

There is something called "Landscaping Cloth" that comes on a roll and looks like black plastic, but it is porous, lets the water seep through, but is still an effective weed barrier. Cut holes through it where you want to plant (2" - 4" diameter depending on the plant).

The newspaper is a good idea too.
It will decompose and add nutrients to your soil while discouraging weeds.
(As advised above, cut little holes through the paper where you want to plant.)
SEE: Lasagna method of Gardening.

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Organic-Gardening/1999-04-01/Lasagna-Gardening.aspx

[Kolesar]

3. We cover our raised beds for tomatoes with a 4ft x 25ft sheet of red plastic

...and cut holes in it where we place the tomato plants. It works well to keep the weeds down. We put a lot of bricks and "staples" around the perimeter to keep the plastic in place. Rainwater tends to pool in a few spots, so we just punch a nail hole there.

Supposedly, the red plastic enhances the growth of tomatoes.

4x50
http://www.charleysgreenhouse.com/index.cfm?page=_productdetails&productid=1770&s=mulch&cid1=-99&cid2=-99&cid3=-99

3x3
http://www.gardeners.com/Red-Tomato-Mulch/VegetableGardening_TerrificTomatoes,36-399,default,cp.html

We only use plastic mulch on the tomatoes because we know that the tomatos like hot growing conditions and hot soil. Last year, we just hoed to keep the weeds down in the beds and the aisles. In previous years, we mulched the beds with newspaper and the aisles with cardboard.

[wildeyed]

4. I used sheets of newspaper over a weedy bed last year and it worked great.

The problem with the system is watering. The rain tends to run off instead of soaking into the soil. Run soaker hoses under the newspaper and it should be ok.

[XemaSab]

5. Maybe you could make paths?

That way you don't have to weed the WHOLE THING and you can just grow stuff in small areas.

We have a 20x40 foot vegetable area that is way too big. We've gone square foot.