Seeding for flowers, Suggest how against birds/weeds?

I'd like to sow seed directly in beds this September. I desire not to grow in pots for transplanting. Have too many for that. New selection of seeds are ready as soon as the many beds are made.

Will make several of what is presently lawn, in front of many large shrubs and under crepe myrtle trees. How to do this now that will best produce few weeds and yet protect from birds eating the seeds and rabbits eating fresh shoots come Spring? Deer and moles can be problematic also.

I can kill off grass and figured building up with new bagged top soil/peet-moss/or whatever. The dilema, if I cover seeds with screen or mulch, how can the flower plants grow? I don't wish to mess up root systems of existing plants/trees, but had thought of laying down rabbit wire. Maybe build cages of netting over each bed? That still doesn't address the weed control.

I task those of experience for suggestions.

You can create little green houses by putting milk jugs over the seeds, basically like winter sowing

No matter what you do to protect the seeds, use wire, glass, perspect (plastic glass) fleece or whatever, it may help protect the seeds but will act like a greenhouse for the weeds, I am assuming by the time you actually plant /sew your seeds, there will already be some weed seeds dropped either by birds, animals or wind, so no matter where in the world you garden, there is no easy fix to prevent weed seedlings germinating as well as our own sewn seeds.

If there was a fool proof way to prevent weeds germinating PLEASE sell the idea to some gardening company and you can sit back and watch the dollars flow into your bank.

All we gardeners can do is keep an eye out from weed seedlings and tug them out the soil before they get any type of proper roots, after a few weeks there will be a pattern to what looks like weeds by the foliage and the weeds as the weeds will one hopes be fewer than a packet of seeds, so you can then separate the weeds away from the seedlings of the flowers you planted.

Hope this makes a little bit of sense to you and all goes well come next years planting, MY own thoughts would be to prepare the soil this year, come early next spring give it a rake over to remove any weed seedlings, I use these as an indicator that the soil is warm enough to go ahead and plant my own flowering or veg seeds, your seeds will soon catch up with anything that was planted winter and laying dormant in the soil where lots of insects, animals and birds will be foraging for any form of seeds and they don't care if they are seeds from weeds or your flowering plants.
Good Luck whatever way you decide to go.
Best Regards. WeeNel.

I would urge you to put a smother layer at this time, topped with mulch, chopped leaves, lawn clippings (as long as you've mowed before grass makes any seeds,) whatever organic matter (OM) you have available and let it sit until spring. This will smother the weeds, decompose somewhat to add some fertility and tilth to the soil, and be already in place as a barrier against spring-sprouting seeds currently on the surface now.

If you are interested in purchasing material, mixing some top soil with the OM on top of your smother would likely allow you to plant there without piercing the smother layer, so even more effective. If the OM you put on top is small enough particles, has some greens in it, and placed thickly enough, adding top soil may be unnecessary. You said it's lawn now where you want to garden, so if it's just grass that needs smothering, paper is fine, 10-12 sheets thick. I prefer paper when nothing really strong needs to be smothered. It conforms to the soil contours better. As it heats up next spring and plants get watered, any yet un-decomposed paper will quickly finish (but probably not a concern where you are, doubt the ground freezes,) giving plant roots free access to the soil below. Mow as low as your mower will go first, letting the clippings fall in place, then a solid, overlapping smother layer.. The dead grass leaves and roots are a great amendment to your new bed as they decompose.

Is your grass a creeping kind? If so, dig a line at least a few inches deep around the edges to separate any connections to the bed area from the lawn. No need to excavate anything, just sever stems and roots with a straight shovel. Then using some kind of border/barrier, even landscape timbers sitting on the surface, will make it SO much easier to keep the grass out of the bed permanently. (Always aim the mower chute away from beds if you suspect any seeds in the grass.)

Keeping the top covered with mulch, leaves, any layer of OM will prevent most weed seeds from being able to germinate, those that do are easy to pull in the loose stuff on top. This is how I've always started new beds, except rare occasions when I've too impatient to go lazy - or had help, digging up grass is not worth the effort, I'd rather wait for it to be smothered.

Just piling grass around the base of trees and shrubs is enough to prevent grass from growing there, eliminating a lot of trimming. (Like shrub pic below.)

Took the pic of flooding on 8/12 but it shows a new bed under construction. I started with some giant sheets of cardboard, outline by sitting timbers in place, then started putting any OM I could find, including some smaller branches from trimming some trees and shrubs. They were covered with green leaves but I didn't want to sit there and separate big sticks from perfectly good OM, so just put it in a pile, covered with more leaves, raked grass after mowing. This weekend I got in there with a pitchfork and it was really easy to move most of the material to other spots that need more 'mulch' and the sticks just fell right out. Last pic is from a few minutes ago. With the tenacious grass we have here, I'm going to let this sit undisturbed until spring. I did dig a little in the middle to add a tiny baby tree and some bulbs, but I knew there was a dead patch in the middle anyway (and why I chose this spot to start a new sunny bed.) I didn't buy anything but the timbers, just moved stuff around.

Giant cardboard: places that sell furniture, appliances, storage buildings, call around, you'll find it for free. Remove any tape/staples, good to go. Try to find plain brown, without glues.

Each pest has its own method of attacking the plants, and different protection may be needed.

Underground pests like gophers, voles and others: Fine mesh under the soil. Connect it to whatever edging you are using to define the area, or else bring it above soil where there is some fencing. Gophers and voles are also willing to walk across the surface, so see also the next part about low pests.

Low pests, but above ground like rabbits: Low fencing, tight enough mesh to keep them out. Secure so that they cannot dig under (connect to underground mesh, for example). This is usually a wire mesh, and can be built in to deer fencing. The lower couple of feet of the deer fencing would have a tighter mesh to keep these lower critters out.

Taller pests like deer: Taller fence (incorporate rabbit fencing if needed), scent deterrents, automatic sprinklers connected to motion detectors.

Birds: MANY MANY stakes with shiny fluttery things, like strips of Mylar from an old balloon. Fake predators like snake, move it often so it looks real. Mount it so it wiggles. Extreme case: Roof the area with a garden netting, a plastic mesh about 3/4" or 1" squares. Lightweight, easy to support.

Pennington sells grass seed that is coated with a fungicide.
Light green in color. Birds do not eat this seed.

You can get it at HD or Lowes...Gita

Purple and Diana... Thank you for the generous inputs.

The weed control is my first concern. So far the Straw Bale garden seems to work for veggies and ground critters hasn't been a problem with that either.

I'm working on the leaves, grass, paper and compost layering. Will be looking for cardboard and OM sources. I need to decide where I want flower and concentrate those areas...

... May just do container beds sunken in the ground so I'm not preparing lots of bed area unnecessarily. NEED LOTS OF CONTAINERS for that.

I read where plastic sheeting speeds up the decomposing and helps kill seeds. Does that not also kill off microbes that are good for garden growing?

Fencing out deer might work as climbing lattice for tomato, bean and cucumber.

Hibiscus and hostas are favored by the deer. All but 2 cantaloupe got bit this summer. I need the neighbors to plant them and okra. I have found that okra planted around the yard and house draws them and rabbits away from the vegetable garden. I'll put in much more of that. Hopefully, I'll get some for myself.

I may expand the straw bale garden and rig electric fencing. That probably would be economical with food market prices on the rise.

Glad to try to help. IMO, I'd rather smother a patch of grass now to be ready for spring, than try to grow veggies in containers, but ones' level of confidence (and preference) is a HUGE percentage of success for gardening. So it would definitely go better for someone who wanted to do that instead. (Also, the ground dirt is already there, free. Don't know what I'd fill containers with.)

If it's only the sprouting of seeds that concerns you regarding birds, I would not try to keep them away once that has happened. Birds are voracious predators of all kinds of bad bugs. If the plants are in no danger from them, they should be welcome visitors. Watching them peck holes in the figs, or eat the raspberries whose thorny vines you've tolerated in waiting for them, is another story...

I'll let others with experience dealing with them speak to the wisdom of trap plants regarding deer, but I have my doubts about that. Seems more like an appetizer, trail of crumbs/map to me but I've never gardened around them.

Plastic sheeting - for smothering? Needs to be removed later, and is a barrier to decomposition above, unlike something that would decompose on bottom, can be covered with leaves & other OM on top. A matter of preference, situation. I've never managed to kill anything with plastic, but admit, went about it half-heartedly a very few times.

As you experiment, you'll see what works for you, where you are, what you want to do. The more ideas you have read, the less hopeless you'll feel if something goes wrong, at least I do. Always something else to try if I want to.

Solarizing can kill weed seeds, and disease organisms. I assume it kills all organisms in that uppermost layer of soil, the part that gets hot enough.
Larger beneficials like earthworms just burrow a bit deeper and get away from the heat. Maybe they bring back the beneficial organisms when the soil cools off (when you stop solarizing). I'll bet the organisms responsible for decomposing are in the guts of the earthworms, and when the earthworms poop (they do this at the soil surface) the decomposers are right there where you want them.

Every year my veg garden beds look like we have tossed duvet's ot and left them, this look is because I have created a wild life habitat and therefore have learned to work with it rather than against each other. After 50 years of gardening I have learned that nature usually wins therefore learn to work side by side and accept a few nibbles from my veg, flowers, shrubs, or whatever we are growing.

Come spring and seed planting time, (were all different when it is growing season) here it's spring as the soil is warming up, after all the hard work of preparing the soil, making the drill's or trenches, I am not going to sit back and feed the birds, mice or anything else my newly planted seeds, the solution for me and most of our friends is to cover the area just planted with white soft horticultural fleece, it is feather light, held in place at the sides and corners of beds by laying larger stones or bricks, after about 6-8 weeks, you can remove the fleece and reuse it somewhere else as I sew my seeds at intervals for lot's of stuff.
This fleece allows light, water, air and sun into the soil under it, BUT prevents wind blowing the seeds around, you can hose the drills knowing your not washing away the seeds, I would give it a try for your area, it costs about the same as a pack of toilet rolls so is not expensive, after use it can be washed in washer, re-use in summer as a sun shade by making a tent with garden canes, helps keep frost off tender plants, I can find many uses for this cloth all season long and even winter wrap over some shrubs that cant recover from wind burn or frosted leaf or stems.
I would imagine this would work in your area you require to plant in winter too.

Hope this gives you food for thought and it helps you sort out your problem with weeds.
Kindest regards.
WeeNel.

On this side of the pond Horticultural Fleece is more likely to be called Row Covers.
Same idea: a lightweight fabric that sits on top of the plants and stops the bugs, provides some shade, and moderates the wind. Still allows some air movement, light and water to reach the plants.

Thanks for interpreting the difference between our lingo Diana, your a star. It's truly wonderful that the garden community can cross the world and at the end of the day, is understood and brings the same pleasure no matter where we live or garden.

Best Regards. WeeNel.