weeds are mother nature's way of keeping her clothes on...

Ridgerunner

Garden Master
Joined
Mar 20, 2009
Messages
8,227
Reaction score
10,049
Points
397
Location
Southeast Louisiana Zone 9A
That's high on my list before winter actually hits and it turns too wet to do much. I try to clean off an area I'll be planting my cool weather stuff (beets, peas, carrots, potatoes, cole crops, and such) in the fall so it doesn't take long for me to get it planted when I have a window. My problem in the spring is not that I get a window warm enough, it's that I get a window dry enough. Sometimes that dry window is only a day or two long.

I clean an area up and spread wheat straw mulch over it. It's often warm enough here I get weeds growing in late winter. So I just rake the mulch off (it needs to dry a bit after since mulch holds the moisture in), prepare it, and plant it. Being ready can make a few weeks difference in when I can get that cool weather stuff started.

You are right, nature abhors a vacuum. if we don't have the ground covered with crops or mulch she'll sprout weed and grass seeds as soon as weather allows.
 

flowerbug

Garden Master
Joined
Oct 15, 2017
Messages
15,878
Reaction score
23,773
Points
417
Location
mid-Michigan, USoA
i leave some weeds alone because i like the flowers. sometimes to my later regret because i forget to get back to them before they start dropping the seeds around.

the large north garden we have i went through and weeded this past summer, took me about a month to get all the sow-thistle out of there (clay subsoil and chasing those roots down a few feet in places). i also had a ton of wide leaf plantains which i pulled the leaves off and left for worm food. the weed pile had a few more millions of seeds added to it.

the other reason for digging so deep in there was that i had buried leaves and other stuff down there years ago and it was ready. leaf mould is great stuff. much like peat. it's now up top where the strawberries will be able to appreciate it.

grasses of various kinds are not my favorites. nor is horse tail. the grasses here are almost all gone. i'm still wishing to turn the last grassy areas into gardens in the next few years. that will cut down greatly in the weeding i have to do. i'm always happy to have more bean gardens. :)
 
Last edited:
Top