New years resolution? Get rid of the weeds!

What new years resolutions have you made? And do you think you’re going to stick to them?

My only thought for a resolution, is to try and get back on top of the weeds this year!

No Weeds in the Flower Borders

I’ve honestly never really had a problem with weeds, until the last couple of years. This is mainly because I use a mulch of bark on my flower borders. It’s something I’ve been doing for as far back as I can remember and it really works!

I only do it every other year and this is the year, as it’s rotted down to the point where you can now see the soil in some places.

When it does need doing, winter is the time to do it. Once all of the perennials have died back and been cleared away. I put a good 3-4” or around 80-100mm, depending on your age!

Virtually no weeds get through. It suppresses perennial weeds, and makes it difficult for weed seeds to root. Which brings me to the two down sides. One, you don’t get flowers seeding around either. But there’s always a compromise! Two, the birds love digging in it for grubs and consequently flick it onto the path!

One Weed causes the biggest problem!

So back to my weed problem, it’s in the fruit and veg growing areas. The reason is, because they are only mulched with compost, which is perfect for air born weed seeds to germinate on. Especially that horrid little weed Cardamine hirsuta – better known as hairy bittercress.

It’s that tiny weed with rosette shaped leaves, that has the ability to set seed within days of appearing.

It shoots up a little flower stem, with tiny white flowers. They turn quickly into long seed pods, resembling miniature pea pods.

As soon as they dry, they spring open, releasing about a dozen tiny seeds.

This is particularly annoying if you go to pull the weed up at that moment, they spring off in all directions and you think, “oh great, that’s another dozen weeds on the way!”.

I don’t remember it from years ago, but it now seems to have taken over the world, popping up in any little crack or crevice, border and pot!

My philosophy on weeds has always been, pick them whenever you see them, and this is where the problem began.

My bad back! I had one of my episodes in October 2021 and as a result couldn’t do any weeding. As the weather remained mild, the weeds just kept on spreading. The asparagus bed became full of weeds, especially bittercress and I thought I’ll get on top of it next spring.

Unfortunately, that next spring (last year) I had another bout of sciatica, and so the problem got worse. The one small silver lining of the heatwave and drought, is it slowed the weed production right down! It allowed me to start to get on top of the problem.

So here we are, a new year and I’m out in the garden pulling up bittercress already. Things are looking promising!

Although something I have learned in the process of writing this blog, is that’s it’s edible. So worst case scenario, I embrace it and enjoy it as a new addition to my salads!

Stay safe & happy gardening.