Ground cover for a small yard

Barrier fabric is a lid, not a cure

Woven barrier fabric stops light reaching seed that is already in the soil. It does nothing about roots that are established underneath, and it does nothing about seed that lands on top of it later. Clear the bed properly first, then lay the fabric, then cover it with something that keeps the sun off the fabric itself.

Overlap seams by a hand span and pin them. A gap of an inch is a line of weeds by August, and it looks deliberate, which is worse.

Pots want drainage more than volume

A thin nursery pot is meant to be temporary and it is honest about that. It drains fast, dries fast, and is easy to slide a root ball out of. That makes it right for growing on and wrong for a plant you want to leave alone all summer.

• Stand pots on a saucer only while you are watering, then tip it out.
• Never stack wet pots rim to rim.
• Give a grow bag a wall or a fence, because a full one is heavy and will lean.

A mat is for the traffic, not the look

A reversible woven mat earns its place where people walk repeatedly in the same line: a back door, a shed path, the strip beside a grill. Lay it where water runs off rather than collects, and pick up the corner every few weeks so nothing sets up home underneath.

Sowing by hand is slower than it looks

A handheld sower is a rate control, which is the part most people skip. Getting seed evenly across a row is worth more than getting it there quickly, because thinning a thick row later costs the whole afternoon you saved.