Destroy everything!

[Kristen]

I think carpet is more of a money-saving tip than anything else. If you don't mind buying membrane, or have access to some, that's fine.

[Matt.]

If you have that much patience all you need is a digging fork. Start now in a corner and keep going bit by bit right through until next spring!

Seriously though I'm sure you would enjoy it if you start growing asap as others have said. Digging is the best method of removing the weeds and roots plus its free and you prepare the soil for your crops. Other threads are talking about crops to plant at this time of year and it wouldn't take too long to clear an area for some onions and brassicas. Remember you don't need to clear the whole plot just enough for each crops needs.

Personally I'd also consider using gylphosate a few weeks before digging as it will help you a lot.

[Two_Sheds]

I put some carpet and old fence panel down on a very weedy plot. Within 6 months virtually ALL the weeds & roots were dead (just a few very weak bindweeds remained). There were about 38 frogs under the fence panel too !

It was unbelievably easy to fork over and get planted. Don't break yourself by digging it now. Kill off the weeds first.

[Kristen]

Worth checking if you have any if the "really bad weeds".

Mares tail : Roundup is unlikely to do much with that, careful diging and extracting will give you the best start (and covering with mulching sheet for 6 - 9 months will also help)

Bindweed or Ground Elder : Roundup will knock that back seriously, and I don't care what anyone says, you won't find every root if you dig the soil, and every little bit you leave, and break, will grow into a plant

I wouldn't be too worried about nettles and brambles - IMHO they succumb pretty easily to hoeing once the ground is operational.

[Kristen]

How about:

If you REALLY don't want to use Roundup:

Cut everything down

Rotavate

Put manure on the top (Rotavate it in is better, but only if you can get some in time)

Cover with mulching plastic

When you are ready to plant (e.g. in the Spring) just plant straight through the mulch - that will give you a further N months of mulch to kill the remaining weeds

[Two_Sheds]

If you rotavate perennials like bindweed and couch grass, you just increase the quantity of plants (a new plant will grow from every little scrap of root that you cut up) ~ they will survive thin mulches, but carpet will certainly weaken them.

[chuffa]

Chuffa

My understanding was that all the weedkillers around like Roundup that contain glyphosate and are systemic, require light as photosynthisis needs to take place for the roots to be killed off. If I'm wrong, I do apologise

You probably are right, but it works for me.

[HeyWayne]

If you do get a bit twitchy you could always resort to napalm - that'll clear a space.

[Antnyant]

Hi All, just joined and in the same boat as Jim but gona go in head first and fight the evil weeds although at 5'8 they are bigger than me so a bit daunting. Im determined to have at least one good sized sliightly raised bed for August planting. Cheers. A.

[Kristen]

I have answered a simpler question in another thread, in case that helps:

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...tml#post258054

[fwuffydragon]

OK, 4 years ago I took over a "half plot" allotment (84ft * 16ft approx) that hadn't been in cultivation for about 15 years. It had been razed to the ground by a tractor, but was absolutely FULL of brambles, and had a large patch of bindweed.

We bought enough heavy duty landscape fabric to cover the whole thing, then started from the front and gradually rolled it back as we dug and planted. We sieved the first 30 feet, as it got ALL the bramble roots out of it, and the bindweed, and the glass. We also found a few feet of chicken wire buried about 1ft down!

Anything big that came up under the fabric (like huge bramble plants) got spot-weeded (I bent a stainless fork on one particularly bad-tempered bramble root!).

We didn't use any weedkillers on it, and the fabric kept all the normal weeds down. I spent about a day a couple of summers ago digging out ALL the bindweed by hand, with a hand-fork, and I would say that 99% of it hasn't come back.

The first year, we sorted out the front 30 feet (growing) and the back 10 feet (shed / patio / lawn / compost). The second year we did the next 30 feet and now, in the 4th year, I only have one bed left to dig over, oh, and the glass to put in the greenhouse!

I'm now re-using the landscape fabric with holes cut in it to plant things like courgettes / sweetcorn / broccoli so I don't need to weed as much. It works a treat!

---

The next door plot rotovated, and now they have bits of bindweed and bramble coming up everywhere!!! Seriously!

The plot on the other side of me did the weedkiller thing, which did seem to work on the small stuff but I wouldn't like to do it - they didn't kill the brambles (which are STILL coming up!!!) and their plot didn't have any bindweed...

---

PS - Make sure you do plant something, even if it's only lettuce and sunflowers, and do show regular progress, as it will keep the allotment committee happy!

Good luck with it!

[roadkill]

rotorvate it about 4 times and then just keep on top of the new weeds that pop through mine has got bindweend and the rest of the ugly weeds and i have been able to grow lots of veg and keep on top of the weeds ... rotorvating is the way forward

[jlottie]

Hi Jim, Just wondering how you are getting on clearing your plot ? Lots of different ways of doing things but once the hard work is done, life gets a lot easier

[sallyw]

we've done pretty much the same we viewed our plot on good friday this year it was freezing cold and me being very naive thought we'd be shown a piece of ground bare but almost ready for planting ( i know but i'd never done this sort of thing before! when i saw the plot i couldnt believe that we could ever do anything with it it was covered in thick grass, brambles, and weeds had3 big mounds of rubbish/rubble and it was sited next to a ton of rubbish, i didnt want to take it on but the OH said it would be a challenge and boy it certainly was!! we hired a mini digger on the following friday it was pouring and freezing cold, we cleared the mounds and moved them onto the dump we had the lot rotavated and cleared a lot by hand we got rid of loads of weeds and have dug and used our tiller, we now have 4 large raised beds, a shed a greenhouse a compost and have been self sufficient in veg for ages even came second in newcomer category 3 weeks ago, i never thought that we could have achieved so much one good thing about getting an overgrown plot seems to be that the soil is very good, it was in our case everythings growing like mad good luck on yours!!

[lottie dolly]

congratulations sallyw on getting second and the work you put into it,tis a great achievement,