The Lazy Girl’s Guide to Weeding
Let’s get one thing straight: You’re really not lazy. You’re just busy, and the last thing you want to do is crouch in the hot sun for hours pulling weeds. Honey, I feel your pain. Here are a few tricks to get your garden in order fast, so you can move on with your life.
Got your own weed control tricks? Share ’em in the comments, please!
World’s Easiest Weeding Technique
When you’ve got a carpet of small, young weeds, don’t pull them up individually. Take them all out at once!
This works best if you wait until the soil has dried, so delay watering one morning. Scrape away the dry soil’s top layer with the edge of a spade. Removing the top 1/4 to 1/2 inch of soil damages the young weeds’ roots, and in most cases they won’t grow back. Make sure you water again once you’re done, to avoid damaging the plants you want to keep!
If you’ve got more ground to cover, you can use a gama hoe or a hula hoe, two tools designed for exactly this use.
Flame Weeding
Yes, you read right: You can kill weeds by burning them. It actually involves applying direct, intense heat, as with a propane torch. You don’t want to literally set them on fire; rather, you’re heating them enough to destroy the cell structure. They won’t appear to die immediately, but will wilt over the next couple of hours and eventually disappear.
Flame weeding works best in tight areas, for example to free onions and garlic that have been engulfed by unfriendly neighbors.
Weed Prevention
The easiest way to get rid of weeds is to never let them get started. A container garden or boxed bed allows you to maintain control over the environment. Fill your bed with rich, fertile and (ideally) weed-free soil. Plant your starts, then cover any exposed soil with a 1/4-inch layer of wet newspaper. The paper will keep moisture in, keep weeds down, and eventually compost right into your soil.
Catch up with Jessica at Love and Trash, or on Twitter: @jessicareeder.
image: Mackenzie Black.
