Friend Mandy shared a post on FB a few days ago with a recipe for an organic DIY weedkiller. The recipe called for 1 gallon of white vinegar, 1/2 cup of salt, and a glug (not a technical term) of dish detergent.
I've never been a big user of chemicals in the garden, and after surviving two bouts of cancer am even less so. The veggie gardens and orchard at Struan Farm are entirely organic. I leave decisions about the farm to my husband and Farmer John, we do use some chemicals to control thistles and blackberry around the property, and drenches on the sheep. For the other gardens chemicals are a last resort; weedkiller is used only after I've tried to dig invasive things out, repeatedly, over time. I've pretty much conquered onion weed and aluminium plant this way (I'm saying this somewhat hesitantly and whispering, hopefully they won't read this....), do have a ways to go with Japanese anemone.
I leave spraying if it needs to happen to my husband.
After reading the DIY recipe, I decided to do a weed killing trial, comparing the effectiveness of the vinegar recipe, Roundup (glyphosate, the usage of which is now banned in the EU and California but not NZ as yet, "we're still reviewing the data"), and boiling water. I'd read about using boiling water to kill weeds, but don't think it's practical for large areas, may be okay for a house in town where you can step out the door with the kettle, assuming it works. We have a strip of weeds running down our driveway that is starting to drive me nuts, so I decided to do the experiment there.
I sprayed Roundup on the first section (yes, wearing protective gloves, etc.), poured boiling water on the second, and sprayed (then dumped) the vinegar and salt recipe on the third. After only several hours, both the Roundup and water sections had started to wilt. But what was even more interesting was that the area I sprayed with vinegar and salt had changed the most, even the thistles:
Hmmm. This DIY recipe actually works! Thanks Mandy!
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