[stompy]

If you start on a plot and use chemicals to clear the site at the beggining, how long does it take for the chemicals to become inactive.

It's 5 months now after the council rotavated my plot, and theres grass, docks, nettles, and about ten other varieties of weeds that i'v never seen before comming through. :shock:  :shock:

I want to grow organically but was thinking of using chemicals to clear the plot just this once. :oops:

How long until i can say i am now organic and have no worries about the chemicals in my soil. :?

Any advice on which chemical to use would be much apreciated.  

[noshed]

Glyphosate breaks down straight away - so you can plant as soon as the weeds are gone. You can be as organic as you like then.
Buy the concentrate (much cheaper than Round Up) and use a cheap watering can or spray (pound shops) to do it, so you won't use it for anything else. It works by absorbing the herbicide into the leaves, so spray or water it onto young leaves and leave them for a few days. Wear gloves and avoid walking over any bowling greens if you've got any on your boots.
Good luck

[Heather_S]

I'll probably leave this to john since he's the expert on this but depending on what you use, once the weeds have been dead and cleared and depending on what you used it might take a few weeks for the chemicals to break down in the soil after that. This is if you're using the stuff that John talks about in his articles.

I don't know what the Soil Association's requirements for "organic" are but I think it's actually a few years working without chemicals  :!:  I know one of the allotments in this area was offering free plots if you promised to stay 100% organic. I guess they want the certification or something  :roll:

(okay I admit it :oops: , yesterday I went on a glysophate spraying spree in part of my plot. It was only growing weeds and it's quite separate from our veg and herbs.)

[stompy]

Thats cool, didn't think it would be that soon.

Just got to get hold of 5000 litres of glysophate now, that should do it.

[Heather_S]

If you have any mare's tail, make sure you remember to rake/bruise them because glyso doesn't work so well on them. They don't take up much through their waxy coating.

[John]

There's no benefit to over-use on Glyphosate, so stick rigidly to the manufacturers recommendations for dilution etc.
Treat it with caution, avoid spraying on windy days, wear gloves and wash any spill spray off thoroughly.
There is evidence that it is not as safe to people as you might like, but I think it's farmworkers etc who really need to be very careful as they are frequent users.
For marestail - forget it. It will just come back. You need amicide for that but it is expensive. Still, careful spraying with amicide keeps the amount down,

Glyphosate breaks down on contact with the ground so by the time the weeds are dead it is safe to plant even if you wouldn't get a SA certificate. Amicide takes 8 weeks before you can plant BUT it is much safer for people being a very simple chemical. Amicide converts with oxygen into sulphate of ammonia which you can buy as a fertilizer.

Incidentally, with both chemicals you can compost the dead weeds.

[comic_muse]

I get a bit strung out about (not being) 'organic'......if I had access to a piece of ancient meadow Ley & didn't think it looked too beautiful as a flower meadow to mess with & I 'gardened it, I might have an organic garden.....if I'm not within a 1/2 a mile of a road, under aircraft flightpaths, somewhere where smoke & spray from other grounds can blow I might be organic....or if I don't compost any 'bought' veggie bits at home (unless all organic too)....& never use other peoples old seed trays or pots, or carpet, or polythene, I might be organic...but if I do any of those things, I might as well use Glyphosate, because the toxisity(sp?) of that is no worse than that which I may well be introducing (especially carpet !!).  I want productive ground giving good quality crops with the absolute minimum of chemical interference.

[John]

Don't get too hung up about being organic - I think the chemical input of even old style gardeners is far less than the average farmed crop.
In terms of being green, well they can't say we've generated any 'food miles'.
What  we can control as growers is the level of input we feel safe and appropriate.  We are free to make our own choices - do we trust the chemical companies or do we think the greens are a load of luddite nutcases?
Whatever way, growing your own is a little bit of independence from a system that sells you water and would sell you the air you breathe if they thought they could.
Right, I'm off to organize a revolution.

Arise ye workers from your slumbers
Arise ye prisoners of want
For reason in revolt now thunders
And at last ends the age of cant.
Away with all your superstitions
Servile masses arise, arise
We'll change henceforth the old tradition
And spurn the dust to win the prize.

So comrades, come rally
And the last fight let us face
The Internationale unites the human race.
So comrades, come rally
And the last fight let us face
The Internationale unites the human race.

[Gwiz]

you dont get lyrics like that anymore.
can i be minister for the interior in your post revolution comradeship?
im going to need a very, very long wall, and a lot of amunition........

[Celtic Eagle]

Waht's wrong with pitchforks and billhooks

 

[John]

Of course, after the revolution, party members will get the plots on fine loam whereas the rest can have the heavy clay to dig over.

Going back to the organic / chemical debate - I think the organic associations are getting a bit 'fundamentalist' about things. Sometimes a little inorganic is justified - for example, I use sulphate of ammonia or urea to get a compost heap going if I've nothing else. Can't always get hold of horse manure or produce enough wee to provide enough nitrogen.
I'm pleased I can get environmentally safe slug pellets now. They may not be quite as good in the short term (they dissolve faster) but I know they won't hurt the birds or hedgehogs.
All gardening is 'against' nature - a fully natural garden is a mass of weeds. So I think we manipulate nature for our benefit but going with nature is better than fighting. Judo rather than boxing - if that makes sense.

[Jake]

You're quite the philosopher John and I quite agree. It also occurs to me that at some point in the future petrochemicals will either be unavailable or incredibly expensive and people will probably look back to the good old days with the same kind of sentiment as jumpers for goalposts.

[noshed]

Warm beer, leather on willow, bikes with baskets... But I must say plastic bottles are very handy round the plot.
Never thought I'd see the Internationale on an allotment website.

[John]

Warm beer, leather on willow, bikes with baskets... But I must say plastic bottles are very handy round the plot.
Never thought I'd see the Internationale on an allotment website.

Well allotments were, until quite recently, a working class thing, although I think the current social mix has changed greatly. Great thesis for some sociology doctorate.
I spent some time working in sink estates and it was so sad. People trying to bring up kids on benefits but unable to cook - buying ready meals or beans on toast.  Large back gardens that were just overgrown wilderness - grass three feet high.  I honestly think that school gardens and basic cookery / domestic science would do more for the poorest in our society than legions of social workers.
Allotments offer huge potential to people but they need some skills and knowledge to take advantage. Mentoring schemes could offer so much.

[noshed]

But sensible policies are no good these days - unless you can get Capita or Rentokill/Initial to run it at a massive profit, paying workers the minimum wage with no pension, they're not interested.
But people are less prepared to put up with all that now, in my experience.
Got to keep on digging