Creating new garden beds doesn’t require you to dig up the turf and turn over the soil. That is, most certainly, the hardest way to do it.
Cutting out the sod and breaking up the soil with a tiller is time-consuming and physically demanding. And when you dig around – or “work the soil” as they say – oxygen is introduced to the compacted earth, which helps break down organic matter to deliver nutrients to plants.
So, you get a quick boost for one season, but afterwards the soil will have poorer structure, fewer microbial helpers, increased erosion, and reduced water-holding capacity.
Building no-dig gardens takes the longer view on soil health.
By piling organic materials on top of the soil year after year, you nurture the bacterial and fungal microorganisms that convert nutrients into plant-useable nutrients. These unseen activities also benefit soil structure, loosening compaction to make the soil more porous for improved moisture retention and air flow.
Many no-till methods—like lasagna gardening or sheet mulching—are mainly geared to creating supremely fertile soil for vegetable gardening. Often, this requires several layers of organic materials, alternating between nitrogen sources like kitchen scraps and carbon materials like straw, to compost in place. But you would need to wait about six months before you can plant in it.
Ornamental gardens consisting of annuals, herbaceous perennials, shrubs, trees, and vines don’t require such a nutrient-rich environment to thrive. Woody mulches and leaf litter are often more than enough to satisfy their nutritional needs.
In my own journey toward converting my lawn to garden, the simplest method I’ve found is similar to building no-dig vegetable beds. Instead of compost, you top your cardboard layer with wood chips.
3 Reasons I Love the Cardboard + Wood Chips Method:
It’s completely free. You can build expansive ornamental gardens without spending a cent. Cardboard and wood chips are the only two materials you need – and it’s easy to find an abundant supply of these waste products.
Save every box delivered to your home or scour the neighborhood on recycling day for plain brown cardboard.
Arborist wood chips are easy to acquire, too; you can have them delivered for free by the truckload.
It’s straightforward. The steps for making these beds are simple. No special tools or equipment are necessary, and you can complete it in a day.
You can plant in it immediately. With cardboard and wood chips, there is no breaking-in period. You can plant your transplants or seedlings just as soon as the garden bed is built. I’ve had excellent results planting in these beds without delay.
Lawn-to-Garden Conversion – Step by Step
The cardboard + wood chips method can be accomplished at any point during the growing season. I find it best to build beds in early spring and late fall when fewer plants are actively growing. These also happen to be the safest times for dividing and transplanting.
Step 1: Prep the site
When you build out beds in early spring and the grass is not yet growing, you can skip the lawn mowing part. Any other time of year, mow the grass down with the blade at its lowest setting.
Most weeds won’t survive being smothered in cardboard and wood chips. As an added precaution, now would be a good time to pull up any persistent weeds, like bindweed or blackberries.
Edging is not necessary to create borders for your new beds. However, having some edge, like stones, bricks, or wood, will better hold the wood chip mulch inside the bed and prevent it from spilling out into the lawn.
Step 2: Lay out the cardboard sheets
The cardboard layer is important for smothering the grass and weeds so they don’t pop up in your new bed. Complete coverage will prevent light from reaching them and block photosynthesis.
Use only clean, non-shiny, brown corrugated cardboard with all labels, stickers, tape, and staples removed. Set them down, overlapping each sheet by a couple of inches. Make sure there aren’t any gaps or holes at the seams.
Step 3: Top with wood chips
With the cardboard barrier laid, begin dumping wood chips on top. After several wheelbarrow loads have been deposited, start piling it up with your hands.
Push the mulch firmly into any edging or border you have, getting the woody bits into all crevices. For better weed control, pile it up to a depth of about 4 inches.
Press the mulch into the bed perimeter first, and then fill the rest in with more wood chips. You can use a garden rake to spread it out evenly.
With the mulch more or less level, tamp it down with your feet. If you can feel the cardboard below squishing beneath your weight, add more wood chips to that spot.
With the mulch spread and tamped down, give the whole bed a thorough watering to help hold the wood chips in place.
Step 4: Plant it up
In a season or two, the cardboard layer will have completely rotted away and disappeared. The earth below the mulch will be dark, soft, and loamy. The transformation from hard ground to luxurious soil is all thanks to the wood chips.
If you are willing to wait a few months or until the next season, planting in these beds will be a breeze since the soil will be very easy to work with.
But that would require more patience than I personally possess.
To plant in your new beds post haste, pull back the mulch to expose the cardboard layer.
Right now the turf below is quite hard and compacted. The goal is to nestle the new plantings into the ground with minimal disturbance to the soil, all while keeping the cardboard barrier as intact as possible.
For small transplants, pry open a small planting hole. I use a hori hori to pierce through the cardboard layer and the top several inches of soil. To create an opening, lever the handle back and forth.
Slip the plant inside, making sure to tuck all the roots into the soil. Press the soil around the base of the plant firmly.
Then return the mulch around the base of plant stems.
For larger transplants, use a shovel to slice through the cardboard. Work it around in a circle roughly the size of your plant’s root ball.
With the cardboard out of the way, slice around and remove the top layer of turf grass.
Dig out only as much soil as you require to accommodate the plant’s root system.
Pop the plant inside. Backfill with soil and press firmly into place.
Return the mulch and water. Always water.
Keeping your transplants moist is the best way to get them established in their new home.
Over the next few weeks, water plants every day it doesn’t rain to help them along.
Despite the earth surrounding their roots being terribly compacted, these Sedums and Bearded Irises are well on their way just two weeks after planting.
I’ll continue to add many more lovely specimens scattered throughout the bed until late spring. Although a young garden always looks so sparse, the plants will continue to grow this season and the next. It’s in the third year, though, when things get really spectacular – lush growth, vibrant colors, fascinating flowers, heady aromas – and it only gets better from here on out. So the more plants you can plant now, the sooner today’s garden-making session truly pays off.
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