[JimS]

Boy, am I sick and tired of weeding! 

It's been our first year with an allotment and I have probably spent more time weeding than anything else.

Weeding before planting, weeding after planting and blerry weeding in between!

I am busy again now, weeding before I throw down a load of manure for winter.

Surely there must be a better way, isn't there?

I don't mean using chemicals, that's ok when you have a new plot to clear but not for one that is already growing stuff I feel.

Is it not feasible to have some sort of low growing, shallow rooting, ground-cover that keeps weeds at bay, yet allows the veg to grow through. Perhaps even sowing it after the veg has gone in and is showing shoots, that way the veg will always be 'one-step ahead'.

What do you think? Is it just an inevitable part of having an allotment or does anyone here actually do something like this?

Jim

[DD.]

What you are describing there is a ideal breeding ground for slugs and other nasties.

[Ice]

I find a nice sharp hoe helps, if you do it often it weakens the weeds.  Best of all, It means I don't have to bend down.

[Jay Dubya]

Hi, i'm with Ice, your hoe is your best tool keep the hoe moving a weed can't grow with the top missing and they soon give up.

[peapod]

One of the downfalls with a new allotment is that all the new digging is bringing weed seeds to the surface and facilitates their germination after all those years.  It does get (slightly)betterI promise! Just keep that nice sharp hoe going

[JimS]

Good point about the slugs DD, I hadn't thought of that 

I do use the hoe a lot, the only problem is that we are on clay soil, which means it goes as hard as concrete in the warmer months, which is damn tuff on the elbows.

My plan is to just keep throwing on lots of manure and growing green manure crops on the unused bits, so that, hopefully, it adds a bit more 'texture' to the soil. But, it's not a quick job, even my neighbour plots, who have had them for years, are only now becoming what I would call 'real' soil.

Aah the joys of allotmenteering eh? 

[peapod]

At least you are going about it the right way Jim 

[Ice]

I also have clay soil and as well as manure I use loads of sharp sand to help with drainage.

[Zippy]

I'll probably be derided for this suggestion but I have found it to work.

Turning the soil and even hoeing will bring up new weed seeds which then grow so you turn the soil over or hoe again and bring up more weed seeds and so on.

May I suggest now we are at the end of the main seeding months that you cover the plots with corrugated cardboard, spread compost on top and then cover the whole lot with either black polythene or carpets and shut out light to kill the weeds while the worms get to work on the compost below.

Then in spring rake any big stuff off (there won't be much - it can go in the compost bin) and dont turn anything in. Just plant your seedlings into the new compost rich soil bed.

I don't turn or hoe soil any longer. I have had my plot for only two years. If weeds do come up I hand pull them and compost them. Once your veggies get bigger leaves they shade out most weeds anyway.

With respect, I believe a lot of hoeing and soil turning is out of wanting something to do and following tradition rather than because it actually needs doing. Try doing less and Nature will do her thing.

[Ice]

With respect, I believe a lot of hoeing and soil turning is out of wanting something to do and following tradition rather than because it actually needs doing. Try doing less and Nature will do her thing.

With respect Zippy, I'll do what works for me.  Not everyone has access to loads of corrugated cardboard and not every allotment site allows the use of old carpet.  Also, black polythene provides an ideal breeding ground for slugs.   Not every veg has enough leaves to shade out weeds either.

[DD.]

Please don't use old carpet.

As Ice says, a lot of councils don't allow it's use. This is not without reason. Apart from being an eyesore, you can get chemicals from the dyes leech into the soil.

[aelf]

I think if there was a reliable short-cut to controlling the weeds we would all know about it - it would be talked about on every gardening programme and the News at Ten! The topics on this forum alone prove that in the end it's elbow grease and a good hoe that does the best job.

Tackling the weeds and the beasties is all part of the challenge - enjoy it! 

[tode]

Jim, if it's just weed seeds growing, these will gradually calm down (as long as there's no others going to seed ! ), but if you've got real nasties, like ground elder, you'd prob. be better off clearing one strip at a time and getting a clean start.
Good weeding 

[CaroM]

My veg patch was a sea of green weeds this year (my first year) and I just haven't been able to keep on top of them (I work from home and also have a two year old child NOT in nursery, so I don't have as much time as I'd like for all this). I did do an awful lot of weeding though! I wasn't really able to stop them from taking over my onion patch, and they clearly didn't enjoy the competition. Managed to keep them off pretty much everything else, though. It was kind of disheartening at times though. I keep promising my other half that it'll be better next year. I don't really believe that, though....

[Clover]

I did try the no-dig Zippy suggestion, which appeals to me on all levels - unfortunately it didn't pan out.  I think it's odd to expect it to when you're excluding any water with plastic.  I was left with a lot of perennial weeds which still needed digging out, the manure hadn't been wormed in and it was parched compacted and full of ants nests.  Maybe I'll try clearing another patch in a similar way but with membrane as the top layer next time.

You're probably right that hoeing is the best way, but like a lot of people I don't have time to cover the whole plot regularly besides which all my neighbouring plots are weedy ones so the seeds would still blow in.

I have found mulching with straw and better still Strulch (expensive but considering the hours saved worth it) at the appropriate time helps a lot even seems to keep the dreaded marestail to a minimum, especially the Strulch but I can't work out why.  Slugs haven't been a problem for me - I use nematode a couple of times in Spring and once or twice in early autumn before I put on compost/manure to feed followed by straw mostly and Strulch in the worst places.  I do wait to do this until the plants have grown big enough to resist a slug attack and hoe in the meantime.

I'll do that for some crops in summer, squashes for example and others in late summer, brassicas.  I have been trying different ways, but where I've done that spring beds are as clean as a whistle when I come to pull back the mulch and I can sow straight away.   The beds covered in summer are also much less weedy than the other bare, hoed, hand-weeded ones.

Maybe that's a middle way....