"What about the flame thrower?," you ask. "It worked great against the seedlings," I reply, "and then I ran out of propane and school started back after Christmas break."
One important fact in the war on weeds. Weeds grow incredibly fast! Miss a weekend of the fight and instead of an army of seedlings that will fall to the flame or the hoe, you have an army of adolescent weeds with roots that require a weeding tool. Using the flame really early on against the seedlings helped, but it can't be my only strategy. One fact in my favor this year is that all the rain has made the ground nice and soft. Also in my favor is that I am pulling them before they go to seed, something that didn't happen last year in many parts of the yard.
So, yesterday I pulled weeds down in the old slough in the northwest corner of the yard. Last year at about this time it was covered by ivy. We took the ivy out with a bobcat and now all the seeds have light and can sprout. I was happy to see that the wildflower seeds I planted are sprouting. I was amazed to see so many tree seedlings--cypress, mostly and prunus ilicifolia (holly-leafed cherry). I also saw some seedlings that I think are a form of native buckwheat, so I left them. But the mallow, the oxalis, and the geranium weed filled my bag.
On Thursday I worked down in the old slough in the southwest corner of the yard (the front yard). I filled a bag that day too.
Today the war will take a break and I think I might knit. The weather is stormy, my hands and neck are sore from weeding, and last night my cough was so bad I was back to taking cough medicine. Knitting seems like a good option for the day.
3 comments:
That's a knitting kind of day if ever I heard of one! But then, so are sunny days on the deck, lazy days on the sidelines of the baseball field, and traveling days in the passenger seat of the car. So, you know..."the worst day knitting" kind of thing.
I was weeding in the back today, around the pond. Holy! Yes, the ground is soft, and the weeds come out fairly easily. We had all kind of rain over a few weeks, and everything was normal. Then we got a sunny week and my flowers and veggies took off like crazy, blooming and sprouting. Guess what? The weeds did too! D'oh! All that sun, I swear they grew a foot and a half last week! I tell myself it's okay, it's like a really long 'handle' to grab them with, and rip them out! haha
A really long handle. That's good!
I really like weeding. I like the tension between pulling too hard and breaking the stem and pulling just hard enough. There's a point in the pulling where you know you are going to get the whole thing. Ahhhhh! So satisfying.
I do worry, though, when I pull out something I can't recognize. In fact, I try not to pull things I don't recognize as definitely a weed. That has led to some very interesting volunteer plants.
Yeah, I'm a bit more of a 'bulldozer', which means I lose some bleeding hearts and lupines that volunteer...it's heartbreaking! But for the most part, it's really, really, REALLY long grass I've got in the backyard/on the hill. It's only in the last few years that I've taken to handpulling anyway. I've given up chemicals, including weed killers. I used to hate gardening because of the entropy, but since I embraced weeding as a meditative, necessary activity, I find I have much more patience for 'garden maintenance' in general. I used to be what I call a "glory gardener", where I would just head to a home improvement center and buy flats of blooming annuals. Since I started getting into native plant gardening, that doesn't happen. Yards look like shite, but I tell myself it's a *long term commitment*. :)
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