planting through weed membrane

I make them 1m girth, if pinning down sheets in newly cultivated soil it's a good idea to put something on top until the ground firms up and the wires grip and stop them from blowing away, I use pallets and old car tyres for that, plus I always walk along joins to firm the ground and push the wires down.

Get the heaviest grade possible and I suggest getting it a minimum of 2m wide and maximum or 4m wide, you may want to consider having a few smaller sheets rather than one large one because that makes it easier to lift individual sections to harvest root crops, roots from previous crops and pests/weeds, leave overwintering crops after others are harvested, get compost/manure underneath where it's needed, plus assist with crop rotation.

The same layouts of holes can be used for different crops, you don't need to use every hole every year, but can blank unused ones off with scraps of Mypex pushed underneath. Cell tray grown lettuce are handy for poking in unused holes for a quick crop whilst the other main plants are growing, or radishes, celery and coriander for cutting leaves, etc.

 

Just started sorting out some 'growing through mypex' pics

Spuds - the main 'problem' is that you can't keep earthing them up under membrane, planting deep + use of membrane stops them from getting exposed to light and turning green, but an alternative means of frost protection will be required. I rotovated, created ridges (not too high as although porous, water will be shed by sloping mypex into the gaps between ridges, even then they may require some extra water during dry spells) planted into them one row at a time marking the locations, rolling out the mypex one ridge at a time and cutting holes above planting locations, pegging down with wire between ridges, planting the next row of spuds and so on ....





I've heard tales of spuds grown under mypex being full of slugs, but again put this down to the way those people grow must be wrong as only 2 of the potatoes harvested from dozens of plants had a slug hole.

Not much to see here, just the remains of my grown through mypex sunflower patch, flowers for bees, flowers for cutting, seeds for our hens, remainder of seeds for wild birds from yet another zero maintenance patch, but yet another plant that requires the sheet to be lifted to remove the roots

 

These photos are SO helpful @Scrungee. Having a huge garden (not moaning!) and getting more arthritic by the minute (definitely moaning) I have to now try and find all sorts of ways to minimize my workload without reducing the amounts of veg I produce and keeping the garden looking decent. By using membrane I will be able to possibly double the area I can cultivate for veg. The area I've got readyish has been a wilderness for many years and therefore =s vast amounts of annual and perennial weed seeds waiting to sprout, by using membrane I should be able to grow something decent without spending hours weeding. If you have anymore photos of different veg growing through membrane please post them up if you can be bothered. Maybe of use to others but don't bother to show the likes of Tomatoes or Cucumbers for me as where I live they are definitely best grown in my greenhouse.

 

Weedkiller and hand weeding don't kill weed seeds, but mypex keeps them smothered with only tiny areas of soil exposed for planting/sowing through. I have everything grown to a reasonable size in cellular trays or 70mm pots so there's no small seedlings competing with weeds, using a bulb planter to form planting holes removes plugs of weed seed infested soil from planting locations, and I would also remove plugs of soil and backfill with compost for seed sowing. If I'm lifting and rotovating I'll often leave the bare soil exposed until I get a flush of weed seedlings then rotovate them in to reduce the seed bank, same when using polythene to cover up over winter. It's 'weed management' rather than elimination.

I thought the pics I can remember taking were on the card in my pocket camera, but they must be in one of my other 3 cameras, I'll check those ...

 

Took some pics today of where I've got overwintering stuff growing where I grew annual cutting flowers, leeks, peas, French beans and sweetcorn earlier in the year:

Leaf beet (for hen greens) with Garlic in foreground and background.




Overwintering Onions, with Sweet Wiliams in background



Onions, Garlic and Chard

 

Thanks scrungee, now I got an idea how to leave space in between for paths. please post as many pics possible.

did you make holes after placing the membrane in place first?

 

Great Scrungee, these photos really give a good idea of how you organize things. It's also easy to see you have the membrane quite taught. If your veg growing skills are even 1/2 as good as you bargain hunting then by following your advice I should be up to my eyeballs in home grown produce next season.

 

Yes, it's much easier to make an X shaped cut using a sharp pair of scissors if the membrane is stretched taught.