Landscaping fabric is a surefire way to cause problems in your garden.
Canadian gardener, Grant Minkhorst (@gardeninggrant), made a TikTok expressing his frustration with a common gardening material.
He states, “I will never ever endorse the use of landscaping fabric.”
@gardeninggrant Do not use landscape fabric in your garden. Most of these products aren’t fabric – but made mostly of plastic. And, within a few years, will begin to degrade into your soil. Weeds will start popping through. And now you will be pulling weeds AND pulling out little pieces of landscape fabric. For YEARS. If you’re looking for a way to suppress weeds in a larger area, place large pieces of untreated cardboard underneath a layer of mulch. Let it break down for at least a year before you start planting. Better yet, use mulch (leaves are the best) and good old fashioned elbow grease to remove the weeds. I’m focused on adding thick native groundcovers to create “green” mulch – layering plants and choking out unwanted invasive plants and weeds. Landscape fabric looks like an easy solution. It’s not. It will give you years and years of extra garden work as well as doing long term harm to your soil. Don’t do it. #gardeningtips #weeding #landscapefabric #gardenfail #gardentok #gardeningforbeginners ♬ original sound – GardeningGrant 🇨🇦
Often touted as a way to prevent weeds from growing, the most common form of landscaping fabric is a permeable polyester sheet, which allows water and nutrients to get into the soil but blocks sunlight. This allows existing plants to thrive while blocking weeds from receiving the sunlight they need to survive.
It might sound like a nifty solution, but the material usually causes more problems than it solves. As Grant shares, the fabric may appear to be working for the first couple of years, but inevitably, it starts to degrade and weeds begin to grow. This makes buying and installing landscaping fabric a massive waste of time and money.
He said, “Not only do you have weeds returning to your garden, but now, you’re gonna have little pieces of this landscaping fabric, all strewn throughout your garden, poisoning your soil with microplastics and compacting the soil.”
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Because the polyester doesn’t break down naturally, the microplastics leach into the soil and can enter our food and water supply, causing issues for plant, animal, and human health.
He suggests using a more eco-friendly option, such as cardboard or a thick layer of mulch. Another excellent way to have a healthier garden is to upgrade to a natural lawn using clover or buffalo grass.
Meanwhile, introducing native plants can save you time and money on lawn maintenance while also lowering your water bills.
These plants can also create a healthier ecosystem for pollinators such as bees and butterflies. Since we rely on these insects for our food supply, making a small change, such as introducing a few new plants to your yard, can have a massive positive impact. Even just upgrading a patch of lawn can help you reap these benefits.
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One disgruntled user commented, “I hate that stuff so much.”
Another gardening enthusiast added, “I have been FIGHTING for my life against the multiple layers of plastic the previous owners used. It has prevented all of the plants from actually growing.”
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