To rotavate weeds or not?

[Nicos]

Areti....can you ID your main weeds?
I know you have mentioned some.

I have a mass of nettles in the field next to one of my potagers and they head off in my direction each year. The roots are pretty shallow so are pretty easy to gently pull up when the soil is moist.

Covering most of it in cardboard is the cheapest way to go - it’s fairly easy to source used boxes of various sizes.

In your shoes I’d follow the no dig advice given above, and maybe , a little at a time, dig small areas with a smaller sized spade if you really feel the need to.

I grow my veg to be as organic as possible, and always try alternative ways first before reverting to things (like pesticides).

Its good you are asking around for different approaches- as yog’ explains already seen you’ll get different answers from most people you talk to

Find what feels like the best method for you, but be prepared to be flexible.

[Snoop Puss]

The no-dig approach is really interesting and I'm trying to move in that direction. One thing I'm doing this year is digging out the perennial weeds and then using a little Japanese hoe, a nejiri gama or nejiri kama hoe, recommended by Jay if I remember rightly but I can't find the post. It requires a lot of bending down (I am lucky in that I have long calf muscles so this is not a problem for me) and a lot of whacking at the surface to lift up weeds and scuff the surface. But it is surprisingly effective once the worst roots are already out. Then I'm going to loosen the soil with a fork, though not actually turn it over, just stick the fork in and jiggle it up and down a bit just to get some air in. Bung some muck and hay on top and that's it. No muck where I'll be trying to grow stumpy-style carrots (Oxhella and Short 'n Sweet) and parsnips.

[Gillykat]

My plot is 90ft x 30ft and been neglected for a couple of years so the nettles & thistles took hold I'm reclaiming it back now and over the past couple of weeks, whenever I get a dry day on my day off work, I've spent a couple of hours just cutting back the dead weed stalks from last summer. These were piled up and burnt last week in a metal fire bin. The plot is looking a whole lot less 'jungly' now and less intimidating/overwhelming so as I now have four days off I'm popping up each day for an hour or two and digging over a small section at a time and removing any weeds I find. I know it takes longer than weedkiller or rotovating but at least it is thorough and leaves me with a nice clean bed to sow my seeds and young plants into and any weeds germinating can be quickly hoed off. I refuse to use weedkiller as why would I want to eat food that has been doused in poison (it's bad enough looking at how much modern agriculture puts on our food!). I'm also not prepared to damage the soil microcosm - have a look on Charles Dowding's site for an explanation of what weedkiller and digging do to the soil
As others have said, don't let the full size of the plot overwhelm you but, instead, do a little at a time (even a square patch 6ft x 6ft) and plant it up/cover it, don't exhaust yourself trying to do it all in one go and...the most important thing...have fun
The forecast is good for the next ten days or so and I have a full week off next week so aiming to get up every day and dig a section and it should look a LOT better by the end of March in a fortnight's time

[nickdub]

One thing that might be mentioned is that potatoes grown in even fairly weedy ground, if they are earthed up with a hoe a couple of times in the Early Summer will usually give you a crop. They don't clear weeds as some assert, but they will often hold their own with them in a way which most other vegetables will not.

[ameno]

One thing that might be mentioned is that potatoes grown in even fairly weedy ground, if they are earthed up with a hoe a couple of times in the Early Summer will usually give you a crop. They don't clear weeds as some assert, but they will often hold their own with them in a way which most other vegetables will not.

On that note, squashes might be something to consider, too. They don't like too much competition at the roots, so it's best to clear a square for them, but then the vines can be left to ramble all over the weedy ground, no problem.

[Grafitti]

Nettles will regrow from any tiny piece of root or stem, so rotovating them will only spread it further.
One chemical that I've used to knock back weeds so I can dig the roots more easily is sodium hypochlorite in a 10% strength solution, kills the weeds (and probably whatever else it touches) but then very quickly goes inert in contact with organic materials. It's what is used to disinfect drinking water, gives it the bleach taste but then if you leave an open bowl of water on the counter after a couple hours the bleach taste has dissipated as it breaks down and loses its properties

[ameno]

Nettles will regrow from any tiny piece of root or stem, so rotovating them will only spread it further.
One chemical that I've used to knock back weeds so I can dig the roots more easily is sodium hypochlorite in a 10% strength solution, kills the weeds (and probably whatever else it touches) but then very quickly goes inert in contact with organic materials. It's what is used to disinfect drinking water, gives it the bleach taste but then if you leave an open bowl of water on the counter after a couple hours the bleach taste has dissipated as it breaks down and loses its properties

Bleach will work just like any contact weedkiller, though, in that it will kill only the bits it touches. So the roots of perennial weeds, like nettles, will be untouched and will grow back.
It should also be noted that sodium hypochlorite breaks down primarily into water and sodium chloride, i.e. salt. A small amount won't do any harm, but you don't want to be introducing salt to your soil in any quantity.

[Areti Woods]

Wow lots of advice and suggestion here, thank you.
Really the only weeds are nettles and purple dead nettles. There is some grass growing on the bottom edge and there was a bit of couch grass on the side I've already tackled, which is about 1/4 of the plot. The ground itself has been really well maintained, the weeds come up quite easily once loosened but the forking and bending is a lot for my back ideally this is what I'd like to do across the whole plot a bit at a time. My aim is to be organic as much as possible so I will try not to go down the weedkiller route. I rootled around in our garage and found a stretch of weed control fabric, a groundsheet and a length of vinyl tablecloth with grass design. Lots of odd stuff in our garage. With these I've covered about 1/4 of the plot, and I've got a stack of cardboard which will possibly do another 1/4 maybe.
No dig technique sounds interesting, I'll definitely read up on that but it'd be a shame not to make use of the existing soil, it has a good tilth. I've attached a coupe of pictures, but as my kids tell me, I'm not great with the camera!
I'm planning on growing potatoes and squash, so those tips are helpful.
I've grown veg in the back garden for years, but there seems to be a big step up from that to an allotment!

[Compostman2]

Article on Weed-free potatoes by Charles Dowding Page 37 of April edition of grow you own magazine may be of help.

[Areti Woods]

Article on Weed-free potatoes by Charles Dowding Page 37 of April edition of grow you own magazine may be of help.

thank you!

[peanut]

It looks great! With No Dig you'll still use the soil, its only the first year where you are killing off the weeds that you add the most compost after that the cardboard is gone, weeds will be minimal and you just add a little topping of fresh compost, the plants will be in the lovely soil, which will be full of worms and goodness from not digging.