Pros and Cons of Landscape Fabric
Updated February 13, 2024
I have been farming for over a decade and currently grow a 1-acre cut flower farm in Zone 6b in Western New York. Landscape fabric is an absolute necessity for my growing operation… in very specific applications. I do not use landscape fabric on every bed, row or path.
You would think using landscape fabric would only solve farming problems but I’ve found that to be completely untrue. Landscape fabric has actually caused a lot of my farming problems due to lack of proper understanding and planning. Some of these problems have been preventable and foreseeable (some of them, not so much). I’ll divulge below.
First, here are the exact landscape fabric and pins we use on our farm:
The Pros and Cons of Using Landscape Fabric on a Farm
pros of landscape fabric
Landscape Fabric very effectively keeps weeds down, and is especially useful in pathways. I will always have the pathways that surround annual planting beds covered in landscape fabric. Keeping weeds down is the #1 (and really only) reason why we use landscape fabric in pathways on our flower farm.
When used on top of beds (with holes burned in for transplants), landscape fabric keeps moisture in, reducing the need to water as often.
Also when used on top of beds with holes burned in for transplants, it makes spacing transplants easy. When the holes are burned into the fabric, there is no need to measure or pay that much attention to where you’re putting plants.
Black landscape fabric heats the soil and plants will grow quicker in it. The extra heat will also get soil microbial activity and subsequent nutrient exchange going.
problems with landscape fabric
Landscape fabric is made of woven plastic and comes with a high carbon cost. The production of this product is terrible for the environment and not at all sustainable.
When transplanting into small 2-3” diameter holes, edges of burned landscape fabric will tear your fingers and cuticles apart. It is also a slower transplanting process. Plugs grown in 50 or 72 trays (or 2” Soil Blocks) take a very long time to transplant into landscape fabric because the size of the plug/block is nearly the same size as the hole. 128 plugs and 3/4” Soil Blocks are easier to transplant into small holes. A Dibber is a planting tool that makes transplanting into landscape fabric easier.
If you cut a 6-ft wide roll of fabric in half with scissors or a knife it will fray long strings of plastic all over the place. I have long and small bits of plastic all over my farm, probably forever, from making this mistake. You can prevent this by always burning the fabric…. never cut it! That goes for cutting planting holes, too. Use a Mag Torch and this propane fuel to burn holes and edges of landscape fabric.
If you don’t use enough (or the correct) landscape pins to keep the fabric down, a strong wind will rip it all up and it will fly all over the place, twisting around itself and established plants. More importantly, if the ground is SOFT, the pins will come right out no matter how many you’ve used. You can prevent this from happening by waiting to apply the fabric in the late spring, once the ground gets hot and starts drying out (late March into April). The ground will dry out around the pins and that will prevent them from coming up in a wind storm. Landscape fabric that becomes loose in a winter wind is one of the biggest nightmares you will face.
Use 6-inch pins with square tops to keep landscape fabric in place, and pound in with a rubber mallet at 2-foot intervals around the perimeter edges of the fabric. 9-inch pins are better, but more expensive. I buy landscape pins in boxes of 1000 because I never dreamed how many I would go through.
Use heavy concrete blocks to keep landscape fabric in place over winter. If you are planning to keep landscape fabric over winter, or permanently, you MUST hold it down with full sized concrete blocks all along the perimeter edges. Concrete can be ordered from Home Depot for delivery, unless you have a local stone supplier nearby. Read this post about Holding Silage Tarps Down with Concrete Blocks to learn our method.
Landscape fabric is expensive. If you have a big farm, it could be prohibitively expensive.
Voles love living under landscape fabric. Permanent landscape fabric will become a permanent home for destructive voles on your farm. Make sure you do not apply landscape fabric on plants that are highly susceptible to vole damage in early parts of the season (delphinium comes to mind).
The worst con of all — If it gets too hot & sunny, landscape fabric will heat up and it will kill tender, newly-planted seedlings. I’ve lost entire crops from the heat of landscape fabric. One year, 70% of my soil block transplants died on the day I transplanted them into the fabric holes. The following year, 100% of a second succession of direct seeds sprouted then promptly died during a recent 95-degree drought we had for two weeks straight in early July. Had I planted those transplants and seeds in soil without fabric, I’m pretty confident none of it would have died. This being said, there are plenty of farmers that successfully grow in landscape fabric, so it’s worth trying out! I just want to share my experiences here so you are aware of what can happen.
in conclusion: landscape fabric is great for controlling weeds in pathways
I have learned the hard way, in so many ways, of how NOT to use landscape fabric on my farm. Going forward, I am only going to use landscape fabric on my pathways surrounding annual planting beds. I will no longer be using landscape fabric to cover beds to transplant into. I would rather transplant and direct seed in rows so I can run a stirrup hoe down the rows to easily remove weeds. I’ll have to weed more often, but I’d rather pull weeds than continue to lose plants (and time and money) due to extreme heat.
I also have permanent landscape fabric on my peony patch. I keep landscape fabric on this part of the field without worrying about voles because they don’t eat peony roots. Also, I have a solid perimeter of permanent concrete blocks to hold the fabric down.
additional tips for farming with landscape fabric
The Dewitt/Sunbelt brand is superior to other landscape fabric brands — I’ve tried others and they are not as high quality.
If you’re using fabric in any capacity, you will need a torch to cut the ends — remember, don’t use scissors or a knife! This is the exact torch I use -and- here is the propane that goes with it.
Buy good 6-inch Square Landscape Pins and use a rubber mallet to drive them into the fabric. Pin every 2-4 feet at the edges of the fabric, about 1-2 inches from the edge.
