Methods of Weed Control for the garden
The weekend Gardener would like to spend more time enjoying the fruits of the flowering and healthy vegetation then pulling unwanted weeds. The most time efficient method of weed control that you can have for your garden is prevention, stop the weeds from growing before they get to be too much. Seeds that are produced from weeds will tend to germinate quickly and grow rapidly. When you are digging and cultivating the seeds are brought to the upper part of the soil and within an inch of the soil surface they will begin to sprout.
As weeds grow, they will start to compete with the other plants, flowers, vegetation, ornamental plants for light, nutrients, and water. Weeds can also act as hosts to different diseases and pests that have the ability to spread around to the other garden plants. Groundsel, as an example has the ability to harbor the fungal diseases rust and mildew, and more likely will have sap sucking-thrips and Greenfly.
Damaging red spider mites and white fly are typically hosted with chickweed. A variety of nightshade species will host viruses and nematodes and have the ability to infect other plants that are from the same family such as potatoes, peppers and ornamental potato vines.
Weeding In An Established Garden Bed
If you have an established garden bed and not planning on sowing flower seeds, then you will be able to use some sort of pre-emergent herbicide. This herbicide treatment helps to prevent weed seed germination. On top of the freshly prepared soil or if you have flowers that are already planted or ground covers, shrubs or trees you want to sprinkle the granules of pre-emergent weed control to prevent the seed germination.
On established lawns and garden beds you can use the pre-emergent weed control to help prevent annual weeds, such as crabgrass, from invading. If you are applying this type of chemical and you have a newly seeded lawn area this will prevent your grass seed from germinating. During treatment you want to try to keep any pets away from any of the areas that were treated with the chemicals.
5 Weed Control Categories
- Natural weed control method
- Chemical weed control
- Pre-Emergent Chemical weed control
- Mulch weed control
- Combined weed control
Types Of Weeds Found In The Garden
Annual Weeds:
Annual weeds will grow from the start of the seed back to the new seed and sprouts a new weed and this all happens very quickly in the spring season. The weeds will flower it will then release its seeds and die before winter.
If the weed gets to the point where it's setting seeds it was known that some annual weeds have the ability of producing a population of 60,000 variable seeds per square yard each year, with most of the weed seeds being found on the top 2 inches of the soil. Annual weeds can come back each year and cause many problems with plant growth and grass. This is because they compete for nutrients, water and sunlight.
13 Common Annual Weeds
- Chickweed (Solanum nigrum)
- Quackgrass (Elymus repens)
- Annual bed straw (Galium aparine)
- Annual meadow grass (Poa annua)
- Black nightshade (Solanum nigrum)
- Fumitory (Fumaria officinalis)
- Groundsel (Senecio vulgaris)
- Harry bittercress (Cardamine hirsuta)
- Knotgrass (Polygonum aviculare)
- Pigweed (Chenopodium album)
- Pineapple weed (Matricaria matricarioides)
- Small flowered galansago (Galansago parviflora)
- Ivy-leaved speedwell (Veronica hederifolia)
Perennial Weeds:
Perennial weeds will live for many years, at the end of the season they will not die. The perennial weed will lay dormant throughout the winter months and will start to be noticeable in the springtime. Each year the flowers and other plant vegetation that you plant will be fighting for the nutrients, water and sometimes the sunlight for growth.
An effective method for controlling perennial weeds in the garden is to dig them up, as long as you get every bit of the plants root system out of the ground. If there are only a few weeds that are found you can use a trowel or tined implement to dig them out. Very important is do not throw your discarded perennial weeds into your compost heap, they will thrive in here and just simply grow. Always discard them separately.
13 Common Perennial Weeds
- Bindweed (Convolvulus arvensis)
- Broad leaved dock (Rumex obtusifolius)
- Clover (Trifolium)
- Quack grass (Elymus repens)
- Coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara)
- Creeping buttercup (Ranunculus repens)
- Creeping Thistle (Cirsium arvense)
- Dandelion ( Taraxacum)
- Elderberry (Sambucus)
- Ground elder (Aegopodium podagraria)
- Hawkweed (Hieracium)
- Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica)
- Plantain (Plantago major)
Common Perennial Garden Weeds:Names With Pictures
Dealing with already established weeds
If you are dealing with weeds that are already established they will usually be deep rooted perennial weeds and the best control is done by spraying a contact herbicide,one of the more popular weed herbicides is Roundup.
You will find these ready to use spray herbicides already formulated and ready for plant weed treatment. This type of weed spray can be applied directly onto the foliage as long as the weather holds up and there is no rain for 24 hours. Typically within a week or two, the weeds will be dead and under control.
5 Methods of Weed Control General Categories
- Natural weed control method
- Chemical weed control
- Pre-Emergent Chemical weed control
- Mulch weed control
- Combined weed control
Natural weed control method
To keep weeds out of the garden naturally in areas where there is no mulch is being used, frequent cultivation about 1 inch on the top of the soil is the best way to control weeds naturaly. When there is newly germinated seedlings from weeds you will find that they will die quickly as they are stirred up and being exposed to the suns heat and drying properties when brought to the top of the soil.
If you have to clear a garden full of weeds you will first want to pull and killed the weeds right at the roots and leaving the soil which will contain the dormant weed seeds. You then want to cultivate and mulch, mulch,mulch really good and not let the weeds have the chance to see any sunlight.
If you're trying to keep your flower bed, vegetable garden chemical free and do not want to use a chemical to control them and stay organic, then vigilance is the key. You want to remove weeds as soon as you spot them in your garden, when they are very young and only have shallow roots.
This will also cause the least amount of disturbance around your nearby established plants. Weeds typically will leave fewer nutrients and take up space in your flower beds, vegetable gardens and on the lawns not leaving enough for the plants you actually want to grow. Weeds can spread quickly so you have to stay on this process of weeding throughout the growing season.
Chemical Weed Control Methods
Any chemicals that you will use to kill the weeds in your garden are known as herbicides. For non-organic gardeners this is their first method of weed control. Chemical weed control is definitely one of the most effective ways that you will have too stop or control any of the persistent perennial weeds. Some of the chemicals that are available can be bought in a concentrated form, this allows you to dilute with a mixture of water and then you can apply to the plants through hose end sprayer or watering cans, or even the pump up weed control sprayers.
Chemical fertilizers and weed control also are available in ready to use mixes. Different types of herbicides that you will buy in sprays are meant to be sprayed onto individual, scattered weeds. When the weeds are starting to die off you simply have to pull them out. If you are working in large flower bed areas it would be a lot easier to dig over the soil and buried the weeds back into the soil, only if they are dead after the chemical treatment.
Some herbicide weed treatments are designed to be selective in what type of vegetation that they are going to kill. When lawns have weeds in them there are chemical weed control methods that will allow you to spray the weed while leaving the grass unaffected. These types of sprayers you must make sure that the spray does not contact with any cultivated plants.
Using a Pre-Emergent Chemical for Weed Control
Pre-emergent chemical is made up of small granules that you can use to scatter over top of the soil to help prevent any of the weed seeds from starting to sprout by preventing any weed seed germination and not allowing it to establish in the soil.
This type of chemical treatment will kill all seeds so try not to use any of the pre-emergent chemical in any of the areas that you have planted recently, or if you are planning to plant any flower seeds. Pre-emergents are typically used in the beginning of the season in early spring when the soil starts to warm up or can be applied in the fall, to prevent weed seeds from germination.it is also designed to prevent crabgrass seeds from establishing.
Mulching can help control weeds
Mulching will help keep weeds down and in some cases will eliminate the need for weeding entirely because it will prevent weeds from growing. Because it is protecting the soil it helps to retain moisture in the soil, this is a great water wise solution as the need for watering is reduced. Mulch is a covering of inorganic or organic material and will help give a garden a very neat, and overall cared for appearance leaving flowerbeds weed free.
Mulching will help control temperatures of the soil as it will spread the temperature across the soil so that plants will suffer less damage from being directly exposed to the suns extreme heat and to protect the plants from evenings cold. Having the soil temperature lower helps with good root growth.
Mulch for your garden can be derived from many different materials and achieve the results that are you are looking for. You will find that some are less expensive, more practical, or easyer to work with. Attractive appearances and colors will also make your choice of mulch for your garden.
Planting in landscape fabric mulch
Landscape fabric mulch will allow you to lay down natural weed control fabric over top of the prepared soil before planting. It then allows you to dress it up with a decorative mulch. Wherever you want to plant your individual plants you just cut holes. Landscape fabric is made to allow water to seep through and down into the ground while it will still prevent weeds from growing and coming up to the surface. It also keeps the weed seeds dormant because they are not exposed to the sunlight.
Organic Mulches
If an organic mulch is what you're going to use you also find that it will improve garden soil quality as it breaks down and adds to the soil known by gardeners as (soil tilth). Some mulching material that you use for weed control is not always very eye pleasing.
Some organic mulches may also alter the soil's chemistry when it is breaking down and added to your soil. Annual soil tests will show you these changes and allow you to adjust the soil with fertilizer applications to help compensate.
List of organic mulch
- Pine Needles
- leaves
- Straw
- Dried seaweed
- Tree bark strips
- Bark chunks
- Sawdust
- Woodchips
- Cocoa bean hulls
- Cottonseed hulls
Inorganic Mulches
Inorganic mulches are things like sheets of porous landscape fabric acting as a blanket, this can be disguised using a decorative layer of thin organic mulch. Inorganic mulches are typically made of inert materials. Which may be a variety of pellet sized bits of recycled rubber tires or may be a variety of different types of crashed landscaping rocks, lava rock.
The advantage of an inorganic mulch is that they will not decompose quickly and have the ability to last for an extended period of time in their environment. Inorganic mulch can sometimes allow you to choose colors to add to your garden depending on the material from black, Cedar, red. The biggest decision that you have for your garden weed control is whether you want to use some kind of a mulch and your second choice would be which kind of mulch to use.
List of inorganic mulches
- Landscape fabric
- Gravel
- Lava rock
- Pulverized recycled rubber mulch
- Plastic sheeting
- Shredded bark and bark chips
- Rock mulch
- Geotextile
Other types of mulches will have an odor when they are fresh or they may be that they are too expensive if you're going to use them in a large quantity. The overall use of a mulch will dramatically help keep your weed problems low in any garden. For some reason if a mulch is not used in the garden is recommended to continue hand cultivation to the top 1 inch of the soil. This is a necessary process that will help expose roots of any of the young weeds and allow the sun's rays to drive them out.
Combine control best method for weed control
Best way to control weeds has been used by many advanced gardeners is usually a combination of method for weed control. This is your best solution especially if you have established perennial weeds that are a problem. Combine control method for weeding involves spraying with the proper herbicides when the weeds are in full growth.
When you start to find that the weeds are dying, this is when you dig the area so the weeds are buried down into the soil. When you find that the weeds are starting to germinate to the ground being disturbed, and the young seedlings are merging you will be able to spray them with a chemical weed herbicide as this is the most vulnerable time and they will be quickly dispatched.
Weed control application schedule
- Early spring:As the season starts in the first part of spring you want to inspect the lawn and plan on the treatment you want to implement. If you're going to use a herbicide, you want to apply a pre-emergent just before any annual weeds, such as the crabgrass begins to grow when the soil warms up in springtime.A typical rule that is followed is to put the pre-emergent herbicide on before before any types of weeds start to bloom such as dogwoods. A good early treatment is to use a pre-emergent that is combined with a fertilizer to help start your lawn off with the right weed and feed treatment.
- Late spring: Between the middle of spring and fall growing season depending on the growing zones you live in you should determine the type of weeds that have come back from the first treatment and use the same weed killer application that you had used previously or you may want to selectively remove the weeds by hand with the combination of herbicide and insecticides.
- Fall: If herbicide is being used on your lawn, or flower beds you want to treat your landscape one more time by using a good all-purpose weedkiller right after your final mowing for the season. You want to take out any large weeds by hand so you can guarantee that they will not come back the next year and survive through the winter.
Hand Tools for Weed Control
If you are not going to use a lot of chemicals to control your weeds in your garden or if you use the combined chemical and natural weed control then you will need specific tools for removing weeds. Weeds will have to be removed by pulling or digging them out, if they are small enough, hoeing them off at soil level. You will find that there are many tools available to the gardener that are specifically designed to help you deal with the different types of weeds.
Top Choice Tools Used For Weeding
- Weeding knife: Will allow you to remove weeds that are in cracks between paving stones and other narrow spaces.
- Daisy grabber: Helps you remove large weeds from the lawn such as dandelions or tree sprouts.
- Draw hoe: This garden tool works best for deep rooted weeds.chopping up shallow rooted weeds.
- Dutch hoe: Very useful for chopping up shallow rooted weeds.
- Weed Wacker: The weed Wacker whether it is an electric or gas can make a quick cut to a lot of weeds at the same time. It will allow you to clear a garden full of weeds in no time.