One of our raised beds was on a spot where there was a lot of couch grass and we neglected to do anything against the couch grass before we made the raised beds. This was one of the kid’s garden beds and we just let them do as they liked and that was not pulling out the grass. After 2 years the raised bed looked like this.
It is very much overgrown with couch grass, although not entirely.
For the most part the soil of the raised bed is one thick layer of roots. The couch grass roots do not really go down, but grow horizontal, sending up new grass regularly. After some time the roots have woven a thick carpet.
It feels like a miracle if anything else would be able to grow in there, but it did. We found some strawberries hanging in there and growing taller to be able to get some sunlight.
But not only strawberries, we had a section with mint, also a root invasive plant, with hardly any couch grass growing through. Same with the tuft of chives growing next to it.
There also was a big plant of oregano in the bed, which mixed in with the couch grass. This made it hard to harvest. We had a lot of work separating the oregano from the couch grass, since we do not want to eat the grass.
Since it is impossible to get rid of the couch grass in this raised bed and we have a new idea for growing food without the interference of the couch grass we cleared this raised bed to make space. We took of the wooden sides and picked up the soil/root carpet that was left with the tractor bucket. The “carpet” really held together and was easy to remove. It was just a thick layer on top of the normal ground.
While clearing the “carpet” we found some lady bugs and this beautiful little burgundy snail.
As for the reason for clearing this space, you can read about it in an up coming post.
Beautiful Chaos 