Here is an hours worth of weeding! Thank goodness I have a good knee pad and gardening gloves for this! Does anyone have any organic tricks for weed removal?
Thursday, July 15, 2010
This is a weekly task, unfortunately.
Every week, I am out there pulling out those @#*$%& weeds. They just keep growing back no matter what. Sigh, this is what organic gardeners have to deal with all the time? Wow!!
Here is an hours worth of weeding! Thank goodness I have a good knee pad and gardening gloves for this! Does anyone have any organic tricks for weed removal?
Here is an hours worth of weeding! Thank goodness I have a good knee pad and gardening gloves for this! Does anyone have any organic tricks for weed removal?
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Well I can feel your pain! I have a couple of post coming up about our garden at the end of next week. You'll see that we have stuff growing between the plants too.....
ReplyDeleteI don't have time, energy or desire to keep ours weed free. I try to keep 2 unwanted's purged out, but that's all I can handle.
Too many other hobbies, things to do. But the good thing is if you can get them out by the root and before they seed, then there will be a whole lot less of them next year!
While I am FAAARRRR from being weed free -- I do have a trick that I love which has been very helpful!!
ReplyDeleteI will lay newspaper down and then cover it with mulch. You can see photos here: http://agirlandhergarden.blogspot.com/2010/04/mulching-mama.html.
Newspaper composts and it helps as an additional weed barrier. You can layer the newspaper with whatever you want -- compost, hay/straw, mulch, etc..
Sometimes I have to trick myself and tell myself to pick 10 weeds each time I'm out walking around the garden. 10 weeds a day adds up!!
I don't have any helpful hints but we're going through some terrific weed growing. Fast! I've heard all the record rain we've had not only made our flowers grow but the weeds are thriving. We had most of the gardens weeded and now you can hardly tell we did it at all. It's so discouraging!
ReplyDeleteI wish I knew a trick. I've been battling some type of brown oxalis that seems to be spreading everywhere and is hard to pull out. I find the easiest time to pull weeds is when the ground is wet. I just get out and do some serious weeding every couple of weeks and then try to ignore them in between.
ReplyDeleteI use mulch to keep weeds down but only in the space between my square foot gardening beds. This is our first year gardening with sfg beds and we've hardly had any weeds. But our old in-ground plot (where we currently grow mostly herbs) gets lots of weeds, and I haven't found any organic solutions aside from good ol' hand-weeding. Like Catherine said, it is much easier when the ground is wet after a rain.
ReplyDeleteBTW, thanks for visiting my blog and leaving me your yummy zucchini recipe. I really appreciate it!
Ugggh...I've been awful about weeding this year. I read an article about covering your beds with burlap and as the weeds grow, you rip them up by lifting the burlap...kind of like waxing your legs. hahaha.
ReplyDeleteI do a better job keeping up with the weeds some years than others. I usually hoe the weeds in the veggie gardens. My favorite hoe is one of those with a circle on the end. I also do some hand pulling. I tend to have fewer weeds in the flower beds, and end up pulling most by hand, but also use a little cultivator dealy to loosen the soil from time to time.
ReplyDeleteMulch, mulch, mulch, nothing goes to seed, extra hoeing and keep up with it in the fast-growing times. For me, winter is the best weeding season, but it's a year-round task. I don't think non-organic gardeners are exempt, either.
ReplyDeleteA hoe is my best weapon in the arsenal against weeds. Very simple. Every time it rains, a thin crust forms on the surface of the soil. As soon as that crust dries out I brake it up with my hoe. The thickness of the crust is usually 1/4 inch to 1 inch. This is very easy to do physically if you do it every time it rains. By braking the crust the path of osmosis between the air and the soil will be broken and transfer of water between soil and air will stop. That (poor man mulch) will conserve moisture and make your garden grow better. When the sun shines on that loose soil the soil temperature goes way up and your garden will grow better. As oxygen penetrates the soil the billions of micro-organisms in the soil will multiply rapidly and that will make your garden grow better. A consolation prize in all of this is a weed free garden like mine.
ReplyDeleteI agree that mulching helps a lot. But sometimes I'm at a loss because I have areas of my yard that are enviably weed-free, and others that have a ton. Go figure!
ReplyDeletePlease tell me you're on your way to the compost bin with your weeds ;-)
ReplyDeleteI do the newspaper with the mulch too, but I use grass clippings on top of the newspaper. For the paths that's really worked well. Inside the beds, the more weeds you pull today, the fewer you'll have to worry about later.