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New Garden Book (Better Homes and Gardens Series)

All New Square Foot Gardening: Grow More in Less Space!

Jerry Baker's Giant Book of Garden Solutions: 1,954 Natural Remedies to Handle Your Toughest Garden Problems

Small Garden

New Complete Home Landscaping

Previous:
How to Choose the Right Plants for Your Climate

Next:
How to Test Your Garden’s Soil

How to Clear a Garden Bed

If you’re starting a new garden from scratch, you need to establish a garden bed—a prepared area of soil where your plants will grow. Before you begin planting or working with the soil, you have to clear each garden bed of any sod, plants, rocks, or other objects that might be covering it. To clear a garden bed:

Mark off the garden bed(s): Define the area(s) of your yard that you’d like to use to grow plants and flowers. To mark off straight lines, plant stakes and wrap twine around them. To mark off curves, lay down a rope or garden hose.
Clear the surface of the site: Remove rocks and unwanted plants. Make sure to pull out the plants’ roots as well as their stalks. Mow the site if it’s overgrown.

How to Strip Lawn or Sod

If the planting site is covered in grass or sod, you have to strip off this cover. To do so:

Water the area: Watering the area loosens the soil, making it easier to dig and remove the sod, roots and all. Give the area a gentle watering about two days before you plan to strip the sod so that the ground is moist but not muddy.
Strip the sod: A spade is the best tool for stripping sod. Holding the spade at a shallow angle, slip its blade just beneath the grass. Be careful to slide the spade no more than 1–2" into the soil. The goal is to cut just beneath the roots of the sod but no deeper.
Remove the sod: To remove the sod, turn your spade to the side. You may have to slice around the edges or at the bottom of the sod to separate it completely from the surrounding earth. Discard the sod you’ve removed by putting it in your compost pile, where it’ll decompose into fertile topsoil.