Garbage bag composting?

[bills]

As usual the weeds are growing with abandon in my yard and garden. I pull hundreds of them from my lawn, most of which I throw in the chicken run. They love them.

My veggie garden has different weeds then the lawn. The biggest problem being chickweed. I methodically root them out, (which is a lot of work).
Apparently chickweed is not good for chickens, (if you can imagine that), and I don't want them coming back when I dig the compost back into the garden. My compost pile is running on the cool side, and I doubt hot enough yet to kill the roots/seeds.

I have been putting them, along with other weeds, in green garbage bags. I hope these will get hot enough to kill the seeds, and roots.

Has anybody used this method before, and did it work? How long do you leave them in the bags? Do you need to put them in a sunny area?

Thanks

 

[Tutter]

It's not the same thing, but I make weed tea. I have a large olive barrel, and put all weeds with water in it. The tea goes back into my garden.

 

[OaklandCityFarmer]

Oh, if only it was that easy. I'd have garbage bags all over the place.

Well, good news is that I think it would get hot enough. I left some in the yard, mixed with shavings from the chickens in black trash bags. They sat for a week, when I finally got my other bin up I pour them in and they were steaming. The bags were so hot they ripped apart.

The weed tea is a great way to make weeds give back to your garden. I like to think of it as sweet revenge. Oh the irony.

 

[patandchickens]

Enh, personally I've seen nothing to make me worry about chickweed for chickens in small quantities.

The simplest way to deal with weeds that your chickens won't eat is to make certain to pull 'em BEFORE they set seed, then let them dry in the sun on a driveway or concrete walkway or whatever for several days, and then toss 'em into your regular compost pile.

Your garbage bags are quite unlikely to heat up enough to kill weed seeds if they're not in the sun (b/c theyr'e so small), and honestly I wouldn't trust 'em *in* the sun to kill *all* weed seeds either.

JMO,

Pat

 

[bills]

Fortunately the chickweed is not at the point of seed, yet...now if I can't keep up with them, some may hit the seed stage...

I really don't see any other choice at this time. I can't really pack them all around to the front of the house and lay them on the driveway to dry, as I have wheel barrel loads of them. I would need a four wheel drive to get up my driveway through them. Hopefully the black plastic and the sun will do a good job of cooking it adequately. I'm sure that it must get far hotter, than a regular hot compost pile, which is supposed to kill roots and seeds. Perhaps after it cooks for the summer, I will add it to my regular compost, and hope it breaks down even further.

Where I live you can't add yard waste to your garbage, so unless I packed it all in my truck and payed to dispose of it, I really have little other choice.

This weed tea idea intrigues me. Do you take it with lemon, or sugar?

Seriously, what does this tea have that would be good for the garden? I would have thought that it may be quite acidic. Do you add any lime to the water?