Spring Weed Management

Here I am again not writing my own post, but linking to someone else’s. But why re-invent the wheel right? If another writer did a good job, I’m happy to lead you to them.

So today’s lesson is Weed Control Techniques thanks to Comox blogger Through Nana’s Garden Gate. I’ll just make a few editorial comments:

Control with Mulch. You’ve heard me rhapsodize about mulch over the years, so I won’t bore you more. Except to say I wouldn’t use shredded newspaper in the garden until it’s been composted in your bin. Imagine walking through it and tracking it everywhere, the racoons and birds taking and depositing it wherever, and just the general mess… But I highly recommend arborists wood chips. You know that!
Cover crops are great, but if you’re planting perennial fruits and vegetables, like asparagus (in the far section in the above picture), that section will have to be mulched, not cover-cropped.
and 4. Minimizing soil disruption applies to digging up weeds as well. If you put your trowel or shovel in deeply enough to get out a dandelion, that’s quite a lot of disruption, and tho’ you may have got all of that dandelion, there are lots more where it came from. I recommend you slice through deep roots like that–enter the soil a few inches away angled toward the root a few inches down–with a Hori knife or any old kitchen knife that can now be devoted to garden work. (That’s what Value Village is for…) Then you’ll carefully lift out what you can, cover the spot again, and then wait for it to return. Yes, it’ll return, but much smaller and weaker and easier to dispose of. As for weeding at night…