Weeds and Compost

It's been raining, which is nice, although it does make for some really soggy gardening. In the meantime, the weeds are getting rowdy, buoyed by the excitement of some real rain.

February is when we get our springtime weather here, and the rain finally got going enough to wake up the plants (those that weren't frozen last month). This year I plan to make the walkway along the East fence (that is, the one in this photo) more of a walkway and less of a muddy pit. I also want to do some planting along the fence. This means I need to deal with the overgrown rose that is taking up a lot of room there.

This is going to be mainly a utility walkway, so it doesn't have to be gorgeous, but it would be nice if it didn't flat-out suck.

The Fern Walk is basically overgrown with weeds. I've got to take some drastic measures in there because it's kind of out of control. Fortunately, this weekend I bought a flame thrower. Using flame to burn weeds is not the safest way of dealing with the problem, but it is environmentally OK, and done properly will not result in a major fire. I didn't have time to try the flame thrower out this weekend, but soon.

Here's an interesting little note: this weedy bed around the apples and quince has a nice tall anti-canine barrier, and while they appear to have figured out how to get behind it and into the bed, they do so only at a slight trot, and have mainly been fairly gentle with the plants. Of course, it still needs weeding. Most of that green is oxalis, though in the front we also have a bunch of ranunculus, and in the back is the Amaryllis belladonna.

This is my current method of weed suppression. I spray with Roundup, then lay down a layer or two of cardboard on top. This keeps the dogs from getting themselves in trouble, and it also seems to work well on the weeds, even Bermuda grass. And look: a use for random chunks of concrete!

And finally, the compost. This weekend I turned the main pile, adding leaves from the brush pile and chippings from the shredder pile, which should accelerate the process in the new pile. At the bottom was a good six inches of nice compost. All I need to do is sift the larger branches and chunks out, and I can use it in the garden.

There's really nothing as satisfying as a nicely cooking compost pile.

Technorati Tags: bermuda grass, compost, weeds

posted by ayse on 02/11/07