Preparing to Plant Flower Bulbs in the Fall (the frugal way)

I've been saving a clipping from a magazine article from a few years ago. I ran across it again today and thought I would share the concept with you today, because it sounds very interesting to me.

We have lousy soil, but I don't want to spend a small fortune to import good garden soil. This seems like a fairly frugal way to produce some fertile soil and some pretty flowers to welcome you in the spring.

With this layering method for preparing a flowerbed, you don't need to remove existing grass. In the autumn lay down a one-inch layer of wet newspaper over the area you have selected for your flowerbed. Do not use colored sections of the newspaper -- only the black print. Next cover the newspapers with two or three inches of peat moss. Then cover with a few layers of five inches of organic material (things like compost & chopped leaves). Now arrange your flower bulbs and add about a two inch layer of mulch on top of the bulbs. In total all the layers together should end up about 1-1/2 to 2 foot in depth. By spring, with the proper precipitation (around 1" per week), the layers will reduce to near ground level. The great thing about this method is that very few weeds are able to poke up through the newspaper layer, and it should create a a rich, loose loam by spring. On top of that, your bulbs should also be peeking up at you.

So if you want to try this, NOW is the time to start saving those newspapers. Here's to plenty of spring color in 2010.

Y Blessings,

Nanci