Organic raised garden bed on top of pre-emergent?

Holly R
by Holly R
I bought a 4'x4' composite raised bed to grow an organic vegetable garden in our backyard. But it just occurred to me that I previously treated our whole backyard with Scott's TurfBuilder with Halts Crabgrass Control in late March. Will this interfere with the veggies? The area where we are setting up the bed is pretty much a bare patch without grass anyway - dry clay soil. Would I need to put landscape fabric down or anything for protection under the added soil/mulch mixture?
  3 answers
  • Douglas Hunt Douglas Hunt on Apr 25, 2013
    OK, I have to ask this question: If you are going to the trouble of raising vegetables organically, why would you use a product like that on your grass? Now to your question: I doubt the Halts will have any effect on your bed. It's a pre-emergent, which acts to prevent seed germination, but your seeds are going to be in soil well above where you applied it. If your bed is 10 or 11 inches high, which is pretty much standard, the roots of most things will never reach the level of your native soil.
  • Holly R Holly R on Apr 25, 2013
    Well the organic vegetables are for my family, mainly my infant, to eat because it's getting too expensive to pay $3.79 for 2 org. zucchini. But the fescue yard was COVERED in weeds since I didn't apply any yard treatments last year while I was pregnant. Honestly I didn't really think/know there were any alternatives for pre-emergent options. (And now the weeds are still out of control so it looks like we need a post-emergent... any suggestions there?)
  • Douglas Hunt Douglas Hunt on Apr 25, 2013
    There are corn-gluten-based pre-emergents. Here's a season-by-season guide to fescue care from NC State: http://www.turffiles.ncsu.edu/articles/tf0017.aspx