Garden help

[Wifezilla]

Not only does bindweed reseed if you are silly enough to let it get that far, it has a huge root and will regrow again and again and again. It doesn't act like an annual around here at all. Then there is puncture weed, and all the other STRONG noxious weeds I have to deal with including quack grass and Canadian thistle (which are easier to kill than bindweed IMO).

I tried salt and vinegar, round up, digging, tilling, torching, boiling water...you name it. The only thing that has worked to get rid of them is without constant back-breaking weeding is very deep mulch Ruth Stout style or lasagna garden methods. Your mileage may vary.

Any new ones that pop up on top of the deeply mulched bed are really easy to just pick out. No digging.

Here is an interesting story about someone and her thistle battle you might find interesting.
http://www.truehealth.org/acanthis.html

and this is why I do not recommend tilling...
"Canada thistle allocates most of its reproductive energy into vegetative propagation. New shoots and roots can form almost anywhere along the root system of established plants (Figure 6). Tillage segments roots and stimulates new plants to develop. Shoots emerge from root and shoot pieces about 15 days after disturbance by tillage. Small root pieces, 0.25 inch long by 0.125 inch in diameter, have enough stored energy to develop new plants. Also, these small roots can survive at least 100 days without nutrient replenishment from photosynthesis."

 

[patandchickens]

Not only does bindweed reseed if you are silly enough to let it get that far, it has a huge root and will regrow again and again and again. It doesn't act like an annual around here at all.

Repeat, all I mean it is *weak* like most annuals are, i.e. does not penetrate mulch well at all. Bindweed is really pretty easy to mulch out. Not that it *is* an annual, which obviously it ain't. IME landscape fabric stops bindweed dead; cardboard or newspaper under mulch certainly do, and even just a 4-5" layer of normal mulch (e.g. cedar bark) will pretty much do the job.

Whereas a number of other things will come up right smack dab thru all of the above including multiple layers of cardboard.

With all due respect, WZ, I am really pretty sure I have as much or more canada-thistle and quackgrass mileage as you do, our entire property consists largely of those two things (not so much as when we moved in though) and I've dealt with them elsewhere for many years prior as well. Perhaps it depends on soil, but in clayey soil, all this "mulch them and they will disappear" stuff does not even remotely happen.

I am not one to advocate tilling in general, I have said that repeatedly; I think it is generally somewhere between wasteful and counterproductive. However if a person is dealing with rather dense soil (as the o.p. is) and the really strong "penetrating" type weeds we have around here (as I suspect she also is), lemme tell you, I have tried all sorts of mulching arrangements and they just do not kill the stuff. You can certainly do things with smothering 'em out over the course of YEARS, but not in THIS YEAR'S garden.

Trying to mulch out quackgrass, thistles, goldenrod, that sort of thing in THIS YEAR'S garden is just a nonstarter IME in this province.

(also I dunno bout the o.p. but around here if you do that it just turns into Vole City and you run out of root crops and bush beans realllll fast)

I still say manually removing the weeds is by far the best tactic, and not that bad unless your garden is really quite large (even then, you can at least do part of it).

However, if that isn't going to happen, what's the best alternative for THIS YEAR's garden? I have seen enough people around here till weedy beds and end up with less weed problems (albeit still substantial) than before, I don't care what the theory of 'bad to cut things up into tiny propagating pieces' says, IN PRACTICE it sometimes does some real meaningful good. At least here, which is not vastly differnt from the conditions where the o.p. lives.

JME,

Pat

 

[lwheelr]

We put a patch of Canadian thistle under black plastic for a year. It came up the next year undeterred.

 

[Wifezilla]

if that isn't going to happen, what's the best alternative for THIS YEAR's garden?

If the deep mulch/lasagna bed doesn't appeal to you, then try this...

http://www.growandmake.com/straw_bale_garden

I used this in a rocky, weedy area infested with puncturevine. Then I deep mulched between the bales with cardboard topped by poopy duck straw. I have peas growing in 3 bales and just planted another with gooseberries and one more with mini melons. I have 3 more to plant and those will get another variety of mini melon.

I am also growing potatoes in garbage cans. No weeding there either. My yukon golds are almost ready for their next layer of mulch. The purple potatoes were planted later and they are just peeking through the soil.

I love not worrying about weeds taking over. After decades of fighting them, I am finally able to relax and enjoy

 

[miss_thenorth]

Well, hubby burned what he could. It rained this morning, not much, so I am hoping to get out there with a shovel and hoe later today. I'll dig up the dandelions and quack grass, and see if hoe-ing will do for the rest. It is really not as bad as I originally thought. I'll turn over areas that are thick. Hopefully I will get to planting some early crops soon, and I think I will put in leaf lettuce in between the slower growing crops. Oh, and I am going to top dress it with some aged manure, since I have some (or lots)