pjkobulnicky
Chillin' In The Garden
There are two kinds of weeds ... annuals and perennials. Annuals are no problem. Their seeds will be buried too deep to surface and if they do they can easily be weeded out. Perennial weeds are tough. These come in two forms ... storage root weeds like dandelion and rhizomatic weeds like quack grass which are the toughest. If the roots of your weeds look like long bean sprouts, they are rhizomatic. These can only be dug and sifted out. They are survivors and will come back sooner or later. Dandelion and its ilk can be overcome with time just by pulling them. Perennial weeds laugh at being torched.
At one point in my life I did a major raised bed garden that was infested with quack grass and every few years I had to dig the bed out and sift out the weed rhizomes. The only way to really kill them is highly unorganic.
Try this ... plant potatoes in your bed at first. Plant potatoes because you can really pile the mulch up on them as they grow, thereby smothering out most of the easy weeds and the others will be easier to pull in the loose mulch. The mulch will itself compost. Or try broad beans (fava) and do the same thing except turn the beans back under when they flower to build the soil ... while pulling out the weeds that are loosened.
Paul
At one point in my life I did a major raised bed garden that was infested with quack grass and every few years I had to dig the bed out and sift out the weed rhizomes. The only way to really kill them is highly unorganic.
Try this ... plant potatoes in your bed at first. Plant potatoes because you can really pile the mulch up on them as they grow, thereby smothering out most of the easy weeds and the others will be easier to pull in the loose mulch. The mulch will itself compost. Or try broad beans (fava) and do the same thing except turn the beans back under when they flower to build the soil ... while pulling out the weeds that are loosened.
Paul
