Flower bed-help

Pious14

Looking to decrease my 1 acre lawn and thinking of cornering off areas for flower beds - the areas are at the corner of the lawn. One will incorporate perennial flowers and the other will have trees planted. How do I proceed-my ideas

1) spray round up on the area where I want the bed. Rotivate when grass has died. Put weed cover over and plant flowers/trees. Put gravel or bark mulch over this

2) put weed barrier over the grass (ignore round up step). Plant flowers/trees. Put gravel or bark mulch over

Is there another way?

With bark mulch do I need a weed barrier.

Is there a way of having a flower bed with just soil and no weeds growing?

Very new to gardening

looksee

While i am all in favour of flowers and trees, they do need looking after, there is no such thing as a weed free flowerbed, and weed barrier is a complete liability.

While I know people say don't have grass going right up to trees, I have never found it a problem. Just leave 8 to 12 inches clear all round so you don't strim or damage the base of the trunk. Do not use a strimmer right up to shrubs or trees, you will take a ring of bark off and the plant will die.

I would plant the trees into the lawn area, you will have to mow round them but if you put them into a bed you will have to maintain it.

A flower bed of perennials is lovely but it requires a lot of maintenance - you will be weeding, at least initially, every week through the spring. Shrubs are less high maintenance and you can get flowering shrubs that will look great through the summer. Either way do not use weed barrier, put down bark mulch but be prepared to top it up and there will be a bit of weeding to do.

Pious14

looksee wrote: »

While i am all in favour of flowers and trees, they do need looking after, there is no such thing as a weed free flowerbed, and weed barrier is a complete liability.

While I know people say don't have grass going right up to trees, I have never found it a problem. Just leave 8 to 12 inches clear all round so you don't strim or damage the base of the trunk. Do not use a strimmer right up to shrubs or trees, you will take a ring of bark off and the plant will die.

I would plant the trees into the lawn area, you will have to mow round them but if you put them into a bed you will have to maintain it.

A flower bed of perennials is lovely but it requires a lot of maintenance - you will be weeding, at least initially, every week through the spring. Shrubs are less high maintenance and you can get flowering shrubs that will look great through the summer. Either way do not use weed barrier, put down bark mulch but be prepared to top it up and there will be a bit of weeding to do.

Can I ask why you would be against a weed barrier? I think you are right with shrubs.

The area I am covering is difficult to mow, on a slight slope and a right angle with wall on one side and fence on the other and think a bed of some kind would be more beneficial.

looksee

Weed barrier is a great theory. However it tends to ruck up and come to the surface of whatever you cover it with. Stuff like bindweed and scutch happily grow great mats of roots under it. If you want to make any changes - if a shrub dies or you want to plant another one it is quite difficult to remove one or plant the other without causing disturbance to the weed barrier and it never seems to go back quite right, then weeds grow through the gaps. Whatever you cover it with tends to blow/wash away as bark or pebbles do not have anything to grip on.

It is useful if you buy the high quality stuff and put it down under a thick layer of pebbles on a level surface for a pebble/gravel patch, otherwise forget it!