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Weed killer on allotment... Which to use
sthlndngrower
Posts: 160
in Fruit & veg
Hello fellow GWers & happy new year,
my allotment is against a border chain link fence. In the summer this is overgrown with bramble and bindweed. Ideally, I would like to fan train fruit along the fence, but really need to get it as free as possible of the bindweeed, although may leave a little bramble at one end for wildlife & other local foragers.
Many people on my allotment site are very anti any weed killer, and generally I am too.... When not overrun by bindweed. I know a glyphosate based solution will be neutralised once it reaches the soil... Would you recommend this, some thing else or not?
Your thoughts gratefully appreciated.
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I don't like using glyphosate either so save it for stuations where nothing else will answer. I too have bindweed which just multiplies when I try traditional weeding so I use glyphosate on that and my garden backs onto an arable field whose edges send invading couch grass, nettles and other nasties into my veg plot and borders.
I use glyphosate along there in spring when they're growing fast and most likely to take it all up and I gather the bindweed up for a close spray or a brush with rubber gloves coated in glyphosate solution. One day I'll win.
I had to use glyphosphate when I first started clearing my plot- I had no choice. I've got no problems with anything growing there now
Thank you all. i think i will use glyphosate once sparingly as soon as the new spring growth begins coming through, hopefully get rid of enough to make a difference. thereafter I will carry on digging out to keep it at bay.
Let the growth expand a bit before you spray, the more green stuff it has to work on the more effective it is.
In the sticks near Peterborough
I also use glyphosate on the boundaries of my plot as I am surrounded by uncultivated fields. I am plagued with brambles, wild willow and a type of field grass which has bulbils at its roots.
I was told to spray brambles in July when they are in full growth.I do not like to use glyphosate either but I could not garden if I did take drastic action. When I plant bushes I lay a 1 mtr square of weed matting around the base of the plant and peg it down which helps to keep the soil weed free, only needing to be brushed clean every so often, maybe when you plant your fan trained fruit you could lay lengths of weed matting in front and behind the trunks