Weed Control

[sall2009]

What do you lot do to protect the soil from weed over the winter. I am planning on covering the garden with black plastic sheet, but could this harm the soil quality as the sheet will block air and water to the soil. I heard about some sort of a plant that can be grown and then it can be dug into the soil once you are ready to grow in spring. Any idea what that plant is?

[Florence Fennel]

Green manure Sall such as Phacelia, Alfalfa, Crimson Clover, there are lots. I suppose any plant can act as a green manure but the specific ones for purpose benefit the soil.

[Two_Sheds]

Weeds don't grow in the winter, however, they do take off fast early in the spring - I cover spare ground with green manures sown Aug-Oct: if you leave it too late they don't grow big enough to cover the soil and shade out the weeds.

It really doesn't pay to have bare ground, always have it covered with something, otherwise weeds will move in.

If certain patches are really badly weedy I cover them with sheets of wet newspaper.

[Snadger]

Vegetable growing in my allotment is a 365 day a year happenning! Soil is there to be grown in .....not covered up (ok, an organic mulch around a growing crop is ok)

Bare soil (brown desert syndrome)or worse still a non organic covering of any kind (black bladdy plastic being the worst eyesore) are an abomination to the eye and a waste of good growing land.

[mothhawk]

Last winter I mostly covered my ground with snow

[Aberdeenplotter]

I dig my plots over in November if possible and then leave them uncovered hoping for the winter to do its worst. If there is weed growth, it gets hoed off and dug in in the spring time.

[zazen999]

This winter it's kales and cabbages and I sowed a tray of my own saved winter lettuce this week - to be grown under a very large cloche.

Then there's overwintering onions and broadies - again this year under a cloche.

And green manures everywhere else that can be sown in time.

Where there are late harvests with no time to sow green manures; there will be a compost mulch covered with straw.

[Chef_uk]

I've used the black suppressant membrane and bindweed still finds its way through the gaps. As i pull it out, the dark green leaves give way to very long light green stem growth which stretches quite a distance.

I've also had a shed on one spot for over 2 years, we moved it at the end of last year to become our onion bed and as it has heated up during the year, all the perennials have sprung up amongst the onions along with a few annuals so i'm quickly starting to think it doesn't work all that well. Of the black stuff i lifted to become beds this year will not be going back down.

I'm just going to let the weeds grow and then dig them out one by one. This will be started right now as we have just lifted out the last of the Lettuces today from their bed and i'm leaving it bare for the rest of the year to tackle the weeds as they come up. As it cools down i'll add some of my homemade compost and leave it over winter handweeding anything thats still coming up.