The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: mindaugas on August 26, 2013, 11:01:10 AM
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Anyone have any suggestions on weed killer products. I have broadleaf weeds like dandelions and crabgrass. I just bought a home and the lawn wasn't well cared for, weeds have spread quite a bit.
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Boiling water on the crabgrass, reseed.
As long as the dandelions haven't blossomed, make salad (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Dandelion-Salad/).
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For crabgrass I just took the time and yanked them out one group of roots at a time. Not hard really since they are so dense in clumps.
Boiling water on the crabgrass, reseed.
As long as the dandelions haven't blossomed, make salad (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Dandelion-Salad/).
What's the matter if they did blossom? Does that change the taste or?...
nevermind.. found it
Just remember you must harvest the greens before they blossom or the greens will be bitter!!!!!!—Rudy
I think I remember the actual flower being very good for you too though?
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What's the matter if they did blossom? Does that change the taste or?
The leaves tend to get a bit bitter for most folks tastes after that point. It can be offset with a sweetener, but the taste is a bit more of an acquired one at that point.
I think I remember the actual flower being very good for you too though?
You can eat the whole plant to varying degrees, including the flowers which can be sweet and nutrient dense. No shortage of recipes.
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On a sunny day go out and dispense a table spoon or so of white vinegar on the weeds. This burnes them so be careful of the grass. Works especially well on weeds growing through asphalt and in cracks between paving stones.
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I see, so I can use vinegar to make the dressing and then just eat them right off the lawn? jk. but seriously, why not boiling vinegar and maniacal laughter?
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The following recipe works wonders on weeds and kick up the action of the straight vinegar only option.
1 quart vinegar + 1 tsp liquid dish soap + 1/4 c salt
I use it on whatever weeds (aka hard working pioneers) that I don't eat.
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This may or may not be useful, depending on where your head's at:
I deal with weeds by not caring about weeds, at least in my lawn (if they threaten my vegetables, that's a whole nother thing). I'm blessed with neighbours who don't care about my weeds, either, which really helps. My lawn still looks good, partly because I mow it long, which gives the grass a chance to compete with the other stuff (if you think about it, regular short lawn mowing is perfectly designed to help out dandelions, which have a low rosette of leaves and a nice deep tap root). I also avoid fertilizing it and I water it only during extended dry spells, which encourages my grass to grow nice long drought-resistant weed-competing-with roots.
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This may or may not be useful, depending on where your head's at:
I deal with weeds by not caring about weeds, at least in my lawn (if they threaten my vegetables, that's a whole nother thing). I'm blessed with neighbours who don't care about my weeds, either, which really helps. My lawn still looks good, partly because I mow it long, which gives the grass a chance to compete with the other stuff (if you think about it, regular short lawn mowing is perfectly designed to help out dandelions, which have a low rosette of leaves and a nice deep tap root). I also avoid fertilizing it and I water it only during extended dry spells, which encourages my grass to grow nice long drought-resistant weed-competing-with roots.
Preach! If only I could get my husband to subscribe to this philosophy...
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This may or may not be useful, depending on where your head's at:
I deal with weeds by not caring about weeds, at least in my lawn (if they threaten my vegetables, that's a whole nother thing). I'm blessed with neighbours who don't care about my weeds, either, which really helps. My lawn still looks good, partly because I mow it long, which gives the grass a chance to compete with the other stuff (if you think about it, regular short lawn mowing is perfectly designed to help out dandelions, which have a low rosette of leaves and a nice deep tap root). I also avoid fertilizing it and I water it only during extended dry spells, which encourages my grass to grow nice long drought-resistant weed-competing-with roots.
Preach! If only I could get my husband to subscribe to this philosophy...
I don't mind the lawn being a bit longer, but it's hell on my reel mower (I think I have a max of 2.5" or 3" on it) and the wife thinks it looks bad. It doesn't help that both of my neighbors trim short as well, so it would stand out.
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When I moved into my home (35 foot wide lot with a sidewalk and a parkway (grassy strip)), the lawn was Perfect. Perfectly doused with chemicals that is. We aren't the type to want to water, or spread chemicals, although I have no problem dumping tons of seed on it.
Since we live in a relatively tight neighborhood we are affected by the neighbors, water that washes up on the grassy strip during storms, etc...
Well when TruGreen Chemlawn or whatever poison sprayer stopped coming over, the lawn went to crabgrass and clover fast.
And I LOVE clover. And I despise crabgrass, because A) it eats everything else then B) dies when the weather gets cold.
So I spent a great deal of time removing the top layer of soil in some spots, and picking and picking and picking it out by the root. And now, a few years later the lawn - except the grassy strip - is mainly crabgrass free, with some good white clover and some scraggly grass poking through. I lay down a lot of seed, and my reel mower needs a good tuning so. One thing to note, in the early stages of this, the crabgrass and the clover were best friends,with the long and stringy sidewise stuff crawling underneath the clover where it was hard to see. I would pull up yards of it at a time.
By removing the direct reseeding, I seem to have taken care of most of the problem, although not all of it. Seed washes, drops, and blows onto our property and its just going to happen. The neighbors have crabgrass, the grassy strip is crabgrass (which I mow as low as possible but turns out it still seeds).
The clover, however, I know that spreads, but it does well in drought and wet conditions, and I for one really like the flowers, as do the local bees. When everyone else is watering constantly and still turning brown, I've got a low maintenance mostly green yard.
Our 150' long gravel driveway is also home to many "weeds", but I've found that a large pump sprayer with white vinegar and dish soap applied on sunny mornings goes a long way towards weakening it, if not killing it outright, and seeding has been kept to a minimum. The vinegar will kill lawn grass so it needs to be used only on areas where you don't want anything growing. Don't skip the soap, it seems to help the vinegar stick or something.
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I don't mind the lawn being a bit longer, but it's hell on my reel mower (I think I have a max of 2.5" or 3" on it) and the wife thinks it looks bad.
Yeah, this is true for me, too. The reel mower works in the early spring, but when the grass tries to go to seed (late June in my area), it puts up fast-growing tougher stems, which the reel mower can't handle. From then on in, I use a string trimmer and let the grass go to about 6 inches long. This sounds really long, but (a) it looks awesome when it blows in our constant winds and (b) my lawn is surrounded by plant and flower beds and fences, so it's never directly contrasting with what the neighbours have. If I lived somewhere with golf-green lawn neighbours, I would definitely have a problem (well, actually *they* would have a problem, but it would rebound on me!).
PS I love clover.