To grow through weed membrane or not?

[Kristen]

Have to say though that the heavy landscaping fabric you've used Kirsten does seem to fray a lot, and this makes it (for me) much harder to cut and to use

I find scissors easier than a knife. But I think the answer is actually to use something hot to melt a planting hole, which would seal the strands and stop them fraying.

needs a layer of mulch on top to fully exclude light and to protect the fabric

The one I have is UV stabilised. I have used weed membrane under hedges in the past, I put a layer of "stuff" on the top to keep the sun off and all that happened was that weeds grew in the "stuff". I've varied the "stuff" from compost, bark, and even gravel and in all instances they helped weeds get a foothold, so now I just use bare membrane (except where appearance is important)

How do you deal with the problem of fraying edges?

I get some fraying where I cut it, but other than that no fraying at all. I think it is important to stop it flapping about, as that increases the fraying.

In terms of carrots, you could try cutting slits across the fabric rather than holes, like I've done with my garlic?

I wasn't sure if that would tend to leave a gaping hole? Not tried it though ...

I have put a piece of cardboard under the membrane to get a tighter-fit with the plant. In particular where I planted some slow-growing hedge plants through membrane and weeds came up through the planting hole too. I cut a square piece of card with a slit to the mid point and slid that in under the membrane around the stem of the plant. I think it will be good for at least 2 seasons, by which time the plants will probably be big enough to cope on their own.

[realfood]

To stop fraying use a blowtorch to form the hole. I use a cooking blow torch.