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GARDENING TIPS HOME
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Garden Weeding Tips
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Weeding the garden is probably the least
desirable task involved with gardening.
Weeding can be back breaking work, but is
absolutely necessary if you want to have a
healthy garden. Weeds take up valuable
nutrients and garden space. They also make
your garden look terrible and unmanaged.
WEED PREVENTION
One of the first things I do before planting
is measure out the spaces between the rows
carefully. I have a fairly large garden so I
can afford to utilize this method of
prevention. I make the rows wide enough to
run my rotor tiller down even after the
plants have reached full size. This takes a
bit of imagination thinking how big a tomato
plant can get etc. |
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It's really not that
difficult for an experienced gardener
though. If you have questions about eventual
plant size refer to your seed packet or find
out through a Google search etc.
Anyway about every 10 days or less I run my
rotor tiller down the rows. This kills most
of the weeds if you do it on a hot dry day.
You can only get so close to your plants
without damaging them so you still have some
manual labor ahead but far less than you
would by hoeing between the rows. Now you
only have to hoe or hand pull weeds between
the plants and the few weeds that are close
to the front of your garden plants.
If you have a
small garden consider purchasing one of
those MANTIS® TILLERS
. They till a small area and can get
between plants if you space them far enough
apart. This takes up more garden space but
saves on weeding time. You have to decide
which is best for you and your particular
garden space and set up.
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WEED YOUR GARDEN EVERY DAY
Yes every day. If you set aside 30 minutes
to an hour every day to weed your garden you
will probably stay on top of the weed
situation throughout the garden season. I
try to weed a row every morning. If I don't
finish it I try to get back out to the
garden in the evening to finish weeding the
row. I prefer weeding during the cooler
parts of the day. It's probably best for me
but the weeds actually die faster when
yanked during the heat of the day. This puts
mega stress on them helping ensure they
don't take root again. If you collect your
weeds and throw them in the compost pile you
don't have to worry about that though. |
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HAND PULLING WEEDS
It's best to hand pull weeds after a good
rain or watering when the soil is good and
wet. The moisture loosens the soil and makes
it much easier to pull the weeds root and
all. Make sure you put the weeds away from
your garden, preferably in your compost pile
or tumbler. Don't leave them in the garden
because they will have a chance to root back
into the wet soil. Most weeds are very
resilient and can actually live after being
ripped from the ground and thrown back to
the ground in damp conditions.
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HOEING GARDEN WEEDS
Hoeing is allot of work. Make sure you put
on some sort of hand protection if you have
tender hands. The idea is to pull soil on
top of the smaller weeds. This suffocates
the weeds which simply kills them. If you
use your hoe to cut weeds off near or even
below the surface you are just prolonging
the agony. You will be right back out there
trying to kill the same weeds you did last
time. Cutting weeds off is kind of like
pruning them. It doesn't kill them, they
just sprout right back from the same root
mass. The next time the weed comes back it
will have an even larger root mass.
Continuing this process only makes the weeds
come back with even more vigor and a monster
root mass. These weeds will be a real pain
to remove the proper way. |
SOAKER HOSE
Soaker hose is usually made of recycled
tires. It is very porous and releases water
very slowly. It almost looks like the hose
sweats on condensates water out. The water
is only released in the area of the hose,
right where your garden plants are. This way
you aren't watering weeds which makes them
thrive that much more. Using sprinklers
simply spreads water to unwanted weeds
creating more work that you probably don't
have time for. I set up an elaborate
watering system utilizing soaker hoses on
every row. I buy T's valves and hose clamps
from the hardware store. I make a "header"
out of regular garden hose by cutting it and
inserting the T's and hose clamps so a hose
can go down each row. I set the valves so
each row gets close to equal water pressure.
I set the system up to a garden hose timer
so the water only comes on at night during
the optimal watering time. Soaker hoses save
water and help with weed control. They keep
water off my plants and keep soil from
splashing unwanted soil born molds from
getting on my plants.
These are most of the methods I use to help
me keep unwanted weeds out of my garden. I
hope you found these garden weeding tips
useful.
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About The Author:
Written By Steve Snyder
Visit my garden seed website. We offer high
quality fresh flower, vegetable and herb seed
for the home gardener.
Millington Seed Co
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