Clearing vegetable patch please :)

squeaky

It really is. I can't physically dig the garden these days - but in my youth it was a regular October Job.

Loadsabob

chrislee765 wrote:

Loadsabob i think this is what i might do. What sort of size wire mesh did you use?

I think the squares were probably about 1cm. So the tiny stones fell through, which is fine, to keep some texture in the soil. And small bits of twig and organic matter. But any weed roots were clearly visable and could be removed. And worms, of course, poor things, which we popped straight back in to the bed! We had to re-do one bed recently, as a tree's roots had invaded. So we lined it with the thick black weed suppressant fabric. Hope that stops the tree taking this particular route!

culpepper

Ive been doing mine for 2 months.I dig it with the pick axe and pull out all the weeds I can see.So far I've got a good 30ft square and have 2 rows of potatoes in and 2 of french beans just sown.Ours has been a blackberry nightmare for 10 years .

The_Biff

Round Up use would prevent you from being organic. As time goes by, several faults are being revealed about this Monsanto product. Frogs & toads are being killed in run off waters. Micro organisms are killed where it falls on soil. You cannot kill with a chemical in nature & think you are doing the right thing.
GM crops are being touted and named by Monsanto as Round-Up ready - that is they do not now absorb Round-Up. (So what happened before).
Agent orange was used to defoliate jungles in N.Vietnam & many people have birth defects right now.Guess who made that? Many US soldiers have died of bladder cancer after going through defoliated areas, including the mad army bloke who formed the basis for the mad helicopter major in Apocalypse Now.

Steer clear of these Monsanto chemicals.

culpepper

we tried glyphosphate last year.We did 2 applications at sunny times(about 6 months apart I think) but hardly anything actually died,thats why this year I thought I'd just dig the lot.The brambles are the main problem for me but the pick axe is very useful as it can get all around underneath them and then I can pull them out.We've had about 4 bonfires and filled 5 garden sacks for the garden waste collection.The sieve idea is a good one,I might try that.We have loads of little stones in our earth (my neighbour says they seem to breed),so carrots would have a hard time.

maryb

Bindweed is the problem in our garden. Can you ever get rid of it? If so, how?

Any suggestions ever so gratefully received.

Some years ago when we had an allotment we cleared some of it by hand but the rest we covered up with abit of old carpet for a few months until we had time to deal with it. It did kill the weeds but the soil seemed a bit sour from being covered up.

If you've got rid of most of the big brambles and you've plenty of time to take over clearing the rest of it, Monty Don suggests just strimmimg it or mowing it every week for a few months. Eventually it turns into proper grass and the other weeds give up. Then you can take the top layer of grass off with a spade and stack it to rot down into loam, and dig the underneath layer.

Has anyone tried this? I might try it if we manage to buy a small strip of land that runs alongside our garden which is a complete wilderness. I could probably persuade DH to do the strimming - funny how a lot of men like the slash and burn style of gardening but not the bent back pull it up by hand bit

squeaky

maryb wrote:

Bindweed is the problem in our garden. Can you ever get rid of it? If so, how?

Any suggestions ever so gratefully received.

The stuff is a right pain. I just dig it out as best I can anywhere I see it as soon as I see it.

I googled on it ---> Click Here