Weeding without chemicals.

LaCrepescule

Pull them out if you must (no such thing as a weed IMO) or pour boiling water on them.

Apparently, the new word for them is pioneer plants….
I just leave mine to get on with it 🤷‍♀️
They really don’t bother me…
And the wildlife and insects appreciate them, even if we don’t

Another vote for the weed burner . My DH enjoys going round with the weedburner - its quite a pleasant job because no bending !

The only weeds I pull out on a casual basis are nettle, brambles and goose grass. The slate gets strimmer occasionally

I used to have an old fashioned flame weeded, using paraffin which worked really well on big areas but it scared the heck out of me a d I worried I might get burned and being on my own that would have been hard.
Hiri Hiri, great tool, also a thing that grabs deep roots and pulls them out also a hand tool. I nearly got on top of some huge rooted dicks this year, actually cutting off bits of the root that I couldn't dig down far enough to remove, and that has been good, the remaining bit I keep hacking at, remember the old rhyme, cut them in May, back the next day, cut them in June, they'll be back again soon, cut in July, they'll be sure to die. But I'm hoping that the work done on the tops through April may and June will help exhaust the root!
Also dug many buckets full of bindweed roots, you'd not believe how much, but still some came up. I have put some finely targeted roundup on some of the leaves, o ly time I'd use it just to try and get on top of it. Hirsetail however is almost uneradicatable. So I wait until maybe July and just pull it up then

Pull them out if you must (no such thing as a weed IMO) or pour boiling water on them.

Sarnia, I pm’d you on Tuesday 🙂

We have a large flamethrower type thing; I think it uses paraffin and it has a shoulder strap - my other half then zaps the weeds with the focused/directional jet flame, job done and no chemicals necessary!

I find that a Japanese digging knife very good. Also known as a hori hori.

Oh, I see you were quoting me...

Good heavens, David Two minds and but a single thought

You won't ever completely get rid of weeds, whatever you may classify them as being.

Sometimes it's like fighting a losing battle but keeping them under control is a little more achievable...

I saw a garden formerly a lawn, where they had put a black plastic barrier matting over the lawn then thousands of large 3 to 6 inch round pebbles on top. At first it was weed free, but seeds & blown dust & leaves gets in between the stones over the years forming compost for seeds to grow in. Eventually after two & half years or so, weeds started to come up between the pebbles, almost impossible to pull out once they have got a hold & you see them, very awkward & painful to walk on too.
Their roots had burrowed down through the matting, & surviving weeds under it poked heads up through the fabric in holes that they had made. It just got worse & worse. Nothing lasts forever, & sometimes it is more trouble than it's worth.

Deep roots can be killed by concentrating the flame on the root centre on the surface and keeping it there for a minute or more. Done once a week for several weeks it is very effective.

Butane gas just burns off the tops and does not kill deep roots

I use wet cardboard all round on new beds. Plant through that as tight to the cardboard as you can, then cover with gravel to hold it down nice and tight. Keep adding divisions of plants particularly geraniums and any nearly evergreen herbaceous perennials to create really dense matrix. If you see anything you don't like including bindweed pull out quickly. Deprivation of light is the trick. Gardeners shadow and all that.

Nettles a re fairly easy because they tend to be shallow rooted but bindweed is a complete horror. You might well have to resort to disentangling it from the plant during the growing season and painting it with glyphosate.😢

That’s the only cure I’ve found, sometimes you have to compromise on principles

M0nica

butane gas fuelled weed burner.

I had one but I couldn't bear incinerating all the little insects which got in the way of it. 😢

I don't think they work too well, either as they just seem to destroy the top growth and leave the roots to revive.

I do a combination of having used weed suppressant cloth on particularly bad sections of garden (it worked). I also find one of those handheld gadgets designated for removing dandelions handy for specific long-rooted individual weeds.

Now I've got my garden together - I tend to the motto of "little and often" to keep a handle on it.

Nandalot

And why is it that weeds like bindweed or nettles grow almost on top of the plant you want to keep so that you can’t pull them up with out damaging the one you want to save?

I think you have to just keep on removing the top growth of the invader and in the autumn or early spring dig up the whole lot, your precious plants and the invaders and dig out the offenders' roots before replanting the plant you want to keep.

Nettles a re fairly easy because they tend to be shallow rooted but bindweed is a complete horror. You might well have to resort to disentangling it from the plant during the growing season and painting it with glyphosate.😢

Baggs

I think the magic formula is called a spade, sarnia 🙃

Yes, the good old fashioned method! I have a long handled gadget for extracting weeks from the lawn but I can also use t if the soil is compact and dry. It’s got spike on the end and a pedal to lever the long roots out…….it was gifted to me because the previous owner didn’t know how to use it! It’s probably the only thing of a gardening nature that’s any use and was free.

My garden is full of creeping ground sorrel, it's pretty with it's tiny yellow flowers and reddish leaves but it's so invasive. It has seed pods that explode tiny seeds everywhere. I have tried everything, dreadful weed killers that don't work, hoeing off at the beginning of the growing season, digging it up, covering with weed membrane after using salt, and burning it off. It still comes up relentlessly every year. If it stayed in the grass I would leave it but it gets absolutely everywhere and whatever I do the 'cure' doesn't last. Weeds are kings of the plant world and grow fiercely wherever you don't want them

I quite like using a hoe when appropriate. It’s satisfying to chop off their heads! They do come back sometimes but just repeating the process eventually weakens them.

Baggs

I think the magic formula is called a spade, sarnia 🙃

No, it's called a trowel by those of us who can no longer use a spade very well, or for longer than five minutes at a time!

Baggs

I think the magic formula is called a spade, sarnia 🙃

I was hoping for something less labour intensive.

And why is it that weeds like bindweed or nettles grow almost on top of the plant you want to keep so that you can’t pull them up with out damaging the one you want to save?