Weeds

One thing that is difficult to keep on top of when the weather won’t cooperate is weeding. That’s why it is important to take every chance you get to attack them.

Our rock garden is quite, well, how should I put it… established. I mean, we have plenty of mature plants in there with some areas left intentionally bare for growth. Years later the bare spots have been overtaken by out of control carpet roses and phlox. Sometimes I think it would be a good idea to pull out a good amount of the phlox, mostly the tall variety as the groundcover species isn’t as intrusive, and maybe the yellow carpet rose too, but at the same time having these well established plants keeps the weeds to a minimum, right? Or so one would think.

Those bare spots, even the little crevices between the plants are breeding grounds for all sorts of weeds. Some of these weeds are easy to pull, especially since there has been so much rain causing the ground to be soggy rather than brick-like. And then there is the grass growing throughout the sedums and succulents, which is nearly impossible to pull without taking a good chunk of the surrounding plant with it. For this there are two options: Pull the grass and be okay with your losses; spray the grass with a specific grass killer. I’ve tried both, and while they both yield okay results, pulling it seems to be the better option for me. You see, succulents in the summer grow quickly and any bare areas will be filled in within a couple weeks if they aren’t too large, whereas spraying the grass will definitely kill it, but leaves dead grass which doesn’t decay as quickly as one would hope. Also dead grass seems to be harder to pull up than live grass, at least to get the roots too.

So last night before it got dark I put on a pair of gloves and decided to pull all the big stuff out of the rock garden. At least if the larger weeds were pulled it wouldn’t look so horrific, and the lawn debris service was coming in the morning so I wanted to fill the cart. After I was finished with that I was able to gauge the situation better, and unfortunately the situation was only slightly improved. All I could see was the ground-hugging weeds covering the beautiful river rock and pea gravel. And from the blue sky I see while typing this post, I believe I’ll be out there on my hands and knees with my weeder this morning trying to clean it up for the summer. Wish me luck.

The Importance of Weeding

As a temporary sun break suddenly appeared early yesterday, I decided to weed the areas where I had planted the beans and squashes. Thanks to the rain, the weeds had decided to take over the bed.

I had planted the beans and various squash about two weeks earlier than our climate normally allows thanks to the warm weather we had been having. Then without warning Alaska decided to send some of her cold air our way and most of our summer vegetables had halted in growth. And then further still we suddenly received the rain, which is great for the peas and lettuces, but is decidedly not so great for a majority of our plants as they are completely sodden from the excess water. Or, in the case of the in-ground vegetable garden area, weeds have decided to grow exponentially large!

So I decided to take advantage of our half-day of nice weather we should have and kicked the dog out of the house to play for a bit, but she was uninterested so I let the chickens out to see if that would keep her occupied while I weeded out the areas that were in desperate need of some breathing room. Of course Kendra, the broody one (and yes, she is still broody, poor girl) was squawking up a storm and feathers all puffed out and Lucy, the dog, was completely intrigued and kept chasing her around the yard. I on the other hand started to pull weeds, carefully making sure not to harm the tender young vegetable starts that had sprouted.

When I planted the seeds for the zucchini, sugar pumpkins, jack-o-lanterns, fairytale pumpkins, green beans and purple beans, I planted the entire package of each figuring about half of those would sprout and from those choose which ones to keep in the ground. Well, thanks to the sudden cold snap and successive rain I’m down to one jack-o-lantern, one green bean, three sugar pumpkins and three purple beans. What didn’t rot from the rain was probably choked out by the weeds, and from the sheer amount of weeds this is not far from the realm of possibility. Looks like another trip to the feed store is in order as I need more chicken feed and cat food and if the happen to have chicks maybe a couple of those to get Kendra to snap out of it. Okay, so maybe that last part is a joke, but I wonder…

Anyway, so after weeding out the major weeds, some of which were quite nasty and intrusive and hopefully not any of the sunflowers I planted, I took a hand rake and broke up the small weeds that were near impossible to pull before using the Garden Weasel to till the remainder. I must say those years of adding compost and garden soil to these areas has greatly improved the soil’s texture and apparently fertility too as evident by the excess of weeds that seem to have come from nowhere. Now it is time to replant and hope that most of this November weather in May and June is over.

The Virtues of Vinegar

Vinegar is one of those household staples nearly everyone has, but how often do you use it? From cooking to cleaning to deodorizing, there is nothing else quite like it.

Now there are plenty of vinegars on the market, ranging in colors and flavors, but they fall into only three categories. You’ve got your finishers, like balsamic, which have such a rich and complex flavor, and are usually quite thick compared to others. You’ve got your cooking, like red wine as well as cider vinegars. And then there is the multipurpose workhorse of the vinegar world, white.

We have two bottles of white wine vinegar in our house. One we keep in the kitchen for cooking, and the other we keep in the laundry room for cleaning. For cooking, I use a tablespoon or two in the water when making hard boiled eggs to make them easier to peel, and a tablespoon of vinegar stirred into a cup of milk is a great substitute for buttermilk in recipes when allowed to sit for at least five minutes. I also use a little white vinegar in my mixing bowl and wipe thoroughly with a paper towel to make sure there is no fat residue when whipping egg whites, as any trace of fat will inhibit foaming, and the vinegar removes it. I would also suggest using your cooking vinegar, as opposed to the cleaning one, to remove mineral deposits from your coffee maker. Personally I find that using filtered water prevents those deposits from forming, but not everybody uses filtered water for their coffee, even though it dramatically increases its flavor.

On the cleaning side, most people know about using vinegar to clean windows, but did you know that white vinegar has the perfect pH to get rid of those unfortunate pet urine accidents that occasionally happen? Got a nasty odor coming from your sink? Well, we all remember the science experiment with baking soda and vinegar, right? Just pour about a quarter cup of baking soda in the drain followed by a cup of white vinegar and allow it to fizz. You’ll not only get rid of the odor, but clean part of your drain as well. This also works for garbage disposals too, and for clearing minor clogs.

You can also use vinegar in the garden. Want an eco-friendly way to kill weeds without pulling them? The acetic acid in vinegar will kill annual weeds as it cannot be absorbed into the root system. This, however, will not kill perennials, just their top growth. But for families with kids and pets, white vinegar is the safest herbicide on the market.