Topic: Do you use chemicals(weedkiller etc) on your garden/lottie?

[mark_h]

After seeing weeds keep popping up on my lottie I've decided its time to resort to my chemicals of mass destruction(round-up).   I hope George or Tony isnt reading this or my lottie might get invaded!! :P ;D     Seriously though, I've set a poll up to see what percentage of readers do and dont use chemicals.

Mark

[RSJK]

I tend to use chemicals to keep the weeds down on the paths between my allotments, and on vacant allotments.

[Mrs Ava]

I have answered that I don't use chemicals, but that doesn't mean I am totally organic, as I don't use organic seeds.

[undercarriage plan]

I don't use any chemicals on my lottie. But have to use slug pellets around young plants in garden or I'd have a plant free garden. And yes I've tried beer etc to no avail, nice beer though..... ;)

[Marianne]

I never use chemicals.  I had some greenfly on my climbing roses the other day. 

Filled the spray bottle with tepid water and went on the warpath.  I sprayed all the affected twigs with my bear hands and am glad to say they have all been desimated.

 ;D

[wardy]

I'm using nettles in my compost bins and to make tea.  Also I'm going to make some soup (recipe from Champneys no less).  My husband who loves weedkiller but hates plants put Roundup on the nettles a few weeks ago. They are now thriving and look very healthy and pretty. ;D  I shall wait and see if they keel over before picking some tops for the soup

My allotment is mostly weeds so I'd need an ocean full of the stuff to make any impression so I've put sheet mulch down and cardboard etc and manure for the worms to take down.  Hopefully in a year or so the worms and mulch will have done the hard work for me

[tim]

Too broad a question.

Certainly use Roundup, selectively, but not on the growing area. Like bindweed, ground elder, nettles & ivy. Mainly painted on.

Certainly not chemicals on food crops. Except Bordeaux on potatoes.

[Steven]

I use Roundup on the more stubourn weeds which wont comply with my requests to leave and once a year,give my lawn a weed/feed treatment,but generally try and keep it to a minimum.

[BAGGY]

When we took on our full plot the guy before us had covered anything not being used with chipped bark.  Unbeknown to us (and maybe even him)  there was loads of chipped bellbind root in it and it spread like billy-o.  We did nuke that with roundup and we did a spray on the paths between our plots.  On the whole that was it but like Tim I will paint the stubborn areas.  I/we haven't used chemicals since.

[Columbus]

I use a squirt of Round-up from time to time. Mostly I dig weed roots out the best I can. At the moment I`m pleasantly surprised by how weed free my plot is. But I`m not aiming for total weed free-ness.

This year I`ve made my paths narrower as the edges of those supported weed growth.
I have a long side of my plot which is allowed to be grassy and weedy as my daffs are there and poppies will come through later. The roots of these are needed to support a change of soil level between mine and the next plot. At the end of the year I will strim it and take out docks and dandelions.
I also allow nettles behind my shed to discourage small boys who may like to lurk there.

I use blood, fish and bone and plan to use beer traps for slugs as I want to encourage natural predators.

When I first got my plot I used slash and burn to clear five foot high weed growth, I think that would have burnt weed seeds.

I was wondering, if I kept a bar of soap in the shed and washed my hands in a bowl before I left for home could I use that water to throw over my roses?

Col

[redimp]

I have never used a chemical on my garden or yet on my lottie - I hope I never have to do so although should the worst come to the worst I cannot guarentee that I will not should every other option fail.  I currently have beer traps down for the slugs and I am grwoing marigolds and other plants to encourage beneficial insects.  I am also embarking on some research, inspired by the bugs and pests thread on the mainboard, into all the different organic 'teas' the french use - some of which are herbicidal/fungicidal/insecticidal.  However, I do not want to compromise the balance of friendly minibeasts that I hope to build up over the coming years.

[Mrs Ava]

ooo yes, I shall be using bordeaux on my lottie toms. :-\

[wardy]

Col    you can use your hand washing water on your plants as it's said to deter aphids or kill em (not sure which)  you can also put it in a spray for a more targeted attack  ;D

[Lily]

A fellow lottie owner gave me a cabbage from his plot.  I knew he used slug pellets around his produce and guess what I found inside one of the outer leaves in the cabbage, you've got it in one, remnants of a slug pellet. :o Not much of the cabbage got eaten that day. 

Chicken pellets is the only thing I have used. And as for weeding, I know it is back breaking but, I just get on with it. What is the point of growing your own if you are going to use chemicals.  I'm not totally organic as some of the seeds are not, but the potatoes are Organic.

Happy weeding ;D

[moonbells]

I started off with my lottie only intending to grow organic carrots as I'd once read about how they soak up pesticides. The rest I was going to grow chemically (if that's an expression!).  I used weedol on the annual weeds and dug them out, and then used Sybol on the cabbages that first season.  But I still got things nibbled, and one day asked a plot owner how he got flawless and large cabbages.

"Spray every couple of weeks" was the answer. I thought about how much pesticide must remain on a cabbage (it can't all be washed out from the inside) and was rather scared.

I haven't used sprays (other than organic-permitted derris for the flea beetle) on anything since. 

And the bindweed? I have a good dig at it every year, and hardly have any field BW now. The hedge bindweed (large white one) is still endemic in my soft fruit but again each year I pull it out and selectively glyphosate the easier to get at bits. So I'm gradually winning. Least that's what I tell myself!

(though if I find the blighters which ate my lovely loo roll-grown parsnips I'll... !!)

moonbells

[northener]

No i don't intend using weedkillers thats the idea of having the plot, getting away from intense farming. Like Wardy i've put plastics down to keep the weeds down until i get time to dig it. Whats Bordeaux? apart from red wine.

[redimp]

A copper compound I think - a big NO NO!!

[mark_h]

Thanks for all the replies so far.     I haven't sprayed the round-up on where the beds are so far.     I have sprayed mostly where the paths are going to be and the boundary between mine and the un-occupied neighbouring plot.   

  These lotties havent been cultivated before  so on the bad side there is a lot of work still to do(and its heavy clay soil!!).   On the good side, I can start with a completely blank canvas.

Mark

[Moggle]

Have picked 'organic' cos I haven't used any chemicals yet.  Not using organic seeds though.

[busy_lizzie]

Never used any weedkillers or any chemicals on my lottie or our garden.  Just dig all the weeds out as best I can.  Have never used slug pellets.  Take evasive action organically with other things, and sometimes use soap sprays etc for aphids  but the rest we live with.  Still have lots of lovely tasty vegetables at the end of it.

We buy a few organic seeds but not all that many, so we are not totally organic either.  I am quite happy with our level of productivity and it is good to know that what we eat is a lot safer than Supermarket stuff. busy_lizzie