Author Topic: glysophate free weedkiller  (Read 6014 times)

lezelle

  • Acre
  • ****
  • Posts: 395
glysophate free weedkiller
« on: March 21, 2021, 14:02:30 »
Hi Ya, Saw this for sale in a shop and wondered if it is environment friendly. Will it harm wildlife. I used to use glysophate based but packed it in when I found out how bad it was. I am trying to find out the contents of this product but wondered if any one has used it or indeed seen it. Be interested in your thoughts

Flighty

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 2,680
    • Flighty's Plot
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #1 on: March 21, 2021, 14:07:11 »
No picture, or details. 
Flighty's plot,  http://flightplot.wordpress.com,  is my blog.

I support the Gardening with Disabilities Trust, http://www.gardeningwithdisabilitiestrust.org.uk

Metanurb

  • Not So New ...
  • *
  • Posts: 16
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #2 on: March 21, 2021, 16:13:05 »
If it's the one I saw in Tesco this week, the active ingredient is acetic acid, so I presumed it was an expensive way of buying vinegar.

gray1720

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 658
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #3 on: March 21, 2021, 18:50:17 »
Yes, I've spotted that - first seen as "Glyphosate-free Roundup" - WTF? I assume it's like the old treatment for broad-leaved weeds of spraying with sulphuric acid and burning off the foliage. One day I'll remember to take my reading specs to the garden centre and check the formulation, I suspect it's rather higher concentration than vinegar - if not it's a rip-off!
My garden is smaller than your Rome, but my pilum is harder than your sternum!

hippydave

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 858
  • Retford. Notts
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #4 on: March 21, 2021, 19:18:36 »
Just use white vinegar, it works very well.
you may be a king or a little street sweeper but sooner or later you dance with de reaper.

Beersmith

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 892
  • Duston, Northampton. Loam / sand.
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #5 on: March 22, 2021, 20:37:22 »
If the active ingredients are acetic acid or pelagonic acid take care as they can easily cause skin and eye damage.  If used to excess they can harm the soil, and for many perennial weeds the top growth will die and then just regrow.

Of course, the absolute best, cheapest and most effective herbicide for annual weeds is called a hoe.
Not mad, just out to mulch!

lezelle

  • Acre
  • ****
  • Posts: 395
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #6 on: March 23, 2021, 10:01:05 »
Hi Ya, been reading up and white vinegar gets listed a lot. I see you say use white vinegar Hippydave and wonder if you use it on your veg beds? does it stay long or can your plant a couple of days later? do you use a certain recipe you have found to work well? Interested to hear. The weeds will take of as I am having to self isolate for 10 days due being in contact with someone who tested positive for corona. another pain in the a---. Keep ell and safe all

Obelixx

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 2,936
  • Vendée, France
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #7 on: March 23, 2021, 12:19:53 »
The problem with any weedkiller or psteicide is that they are not discriminatory and will affect beneficial soil organisms too, especially the ones you can't see but which are essential to soil health.

I'd go with hoeing and then No Dig after first getting OH to dig out things with deep tap roots.

This list of weed killers and their contents may be useful if you really want to spray - https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/pdfs/weedkiller-for-home-gardeners.pdf
Obxx - Vendée France

BarriedaleNick

  • Global Moderator
  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 4,133
  • Cartaxo, Portugal
    • Barriedale Allotments
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #8 on: March 23, 2021, 16:51:25 »
I might use vinegar for weeds on a path or patio but I'd be much less willing to spray it around the veg garden - it is just an acid.  You can get horticultural vinegar which is strong enough to cause severe eye damage and is used as a defoliant.
My paradise in Portugal is somewhat marred by field bindweed, couch grass and some odd local invasive tough grass\weed.  I've been digging it out covering it up  and hoeing but I have reverted to glysophate.  The previous owners just rotovated all the time so all the weeds are spread everywhere...
Muito trabalho!
Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

Obelixx

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 2,936
  • Vendée, France
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #9 on: March 23, 2021, 18:51:21 »
We have field bindweed too Barriedale Nick.  Glyphosate didn't fix it.

Our farmer neighbour gave us a huge sheet of plastic to cover up bare earth in our potager while we worked in another part of it.  2 years later guess what's alive and well - tho pale yellow - and running along the surface of the soil.  Bindweed.

In existing beds I do fork things over before improving the soil and planting anything.  New beds we make this spring are getting the cardboard and mulch treatment.
Obxx - Vendée France

lezelle

  • Acre
  • ****
  • Posts: 395
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #10 on: March 24, 2021, 10:10:08 »
Hi Ya, Well I think I will follow my normal way and keep away from weed killers. I have started, due to disability, a partial no dig system. I had some areas covered initially with black plastic and have covered under the fruit trees etc with cardboard. I am surprised how quickly the cardboard breaks down. I have been after the bind weed for years and believe I am starting to get it down but you have to be on it all the time. Thanks for the reply's everyone. Its a weeding I will go. I do have the loan of a flame gun so may use that as well. Bind weed is not such a problem as the rest of the annual weeds. Good luck all

gray1720

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 658
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #11 on: March 24, 2021, 10:22:20 »
Funnily enough, I found that field bindweed responded very well (ie it sulked, and struggled to take over in anything like its usual way) to hoeing - I got a dutch hoe last year, plus bugger-all else to do, and the difference it made to the ease of hoeing was astonishing. So this year it'll mostly be the dutch hoe. Mind you, I don't know how big your new baby is, Nick.

Unfortunately I lost most of a summer on the plot in 2017 when my father died and that's when the hedge bindweed that had been doing its best to encroach from a derelict plot next door got stuck in. Thankfully we have a more pragmatic chairman than the previous all-chemicals-are-evil-all scientists-are-evil* one, and I am using super-strength Roundup gel every time it shows its head (on that and nothing else) - digging out the big bits is fine, but we all know how small a bit will regenerate.... It seemed to be in retreat by late summer last year, and hopefully will remain so. The stuff is a ****ing menace on my plot!

Is glyphosate evil? Frankly I don't know, but I can tell you that there's some really bad science been published by its opponents, which doesn't give me much confidence in their arguments. Nothing is risk-free (eg see this for details of acetic acid: http://science.cleapss.org.uk/resource/SSS023-Ethanoic-acetic-acid.pdf, it will certainly make worms very unhappy indeed), I use the smallest amount that works I can, on as few weeds as possible.

*As a scientist, I was particularly peeved by this. Especially as our water comes from the Thames, so we get the benefit of everything put on every field upstream of us!
My garden is smaller than your Rome, but my pilum is harder than your sternum!

Obelixx

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 2,936
  • Vendée, France
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #12 on: March 24, 2021, 13:50:31 »
Glyphosate has been found in water courses all over Europe and I do wonder about how that is affecting the water we drink and the wildlife, not to mention cattle, sheep, pigs, fish and other aquatic creatures who drink from or live in those waters.

I also think Monsanto is a deeply flawed amoral company run purely for profits and with little regard to the environment and especially the communities who grow and use its seeds and chemicals.

Bindweed here is sneaky.   It has very pretty pink tinged flowers which are fine in the wilder grass and wildflower areas of our plot but a pain in the veg garden and other beds.  It has the thick, white easily identifiable roots near the surface but they are brittle so break easily when forking or planting or hoeing.  The sneaky bit is the deeper roots which are brown and coiled like springs and seem to go down to China.   Very hard to spot and clear and each one would need a gallon of glyphosate to get right down to the last cell of the roots.

We're sticking with hoeing and cardboard and mulching.
Obxx - Vendée France

Beersmith

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 892
  • Duston, Northampton. Loam / sand.
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #13 on: March 24, 2021, 22:26:16 »

Is glyphosate evil? Frankly I don't know, but I can tell you that there's some really bad science been published by its opponents, which doesn't give me much confidence in their arguments. Nothing is risk-free (eg see this for details of acetic acid: http://science.cleapss.org.uk/resource/SSS023-Ethanoic-acetic-acid.pdf, it will certainly make worms very unhappy indeed), I use the smallest amount that works I can, on as few weeds as possible.


This coincides with my own thinking. The empirical evidence is that glyphosate is low toxicity for animals birds and fish but worse for amphibians, and depending on soil conditions degrades sometimes quickly sometimes slowly.

But the world's agro businesses take this as justification to spread literally millions of tons of the stuff every year, often not even as a herbicide but a coupled to the use of resistant genetically modified crops, making profits from both the seed and the herbicide. 

The contrast between your cautious approach (my bolding above) and their total lack of constraint could hardly be greater.

Not mad, just out to mulch!

BarriedaleNick

  • Global Moderator
  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 4,133
  • Cartaxo, Portugal
    • Barriedale Allotments
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #14 on: March 25, 2021, 10:00:04 »
The commercial practice of using weedkiller, well glyphosate, to ripen wheat crops is what gets my goat. It is used to kill the plant and desiccate the crops a week or two prior to harvest..
I am happy to use it in moderation on stubborn weeds but this seems a bit much.
Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

gray1720

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 658
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #15 on: March 25, 2021, 11:51:10 »
Indeed, Nick. I think that says it all. There is a huge difference between dabbing a bit of gel on something tough and throwing it around like it's going out of fashion. Being out in the sun and living longer are almost certainly the biggest risk factors for most of us, certainly for cancers.
My garden is smaller than your Rome, but my pilum is harder than your sternum!

Paulh

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 592
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #16 on: March 25, 2021, 12:05:54 »
Thanks all, an informative thread which confirms my policy of using glyphosate very occasionally, sparingly and carefully on bindweed and the like which I've not been able to deal with by digging or mulching.

Tee Gee

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 6,926
  • Huddersfield - Light humus rich soil
    • The Gardener's Almanac
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #17 on: March 25, 2021, 12:37:27 »
If and when I have to use a herbicide I tend to use Sodium Chlorate as it gives me more control over its application.

If I have a clump of pernicious weeds I want to get rid of! I place a pinch of the stuff into the crown of the offending plant/s

At least this method does not create the potential for 'overspray' as is possible from using a liquid herbicide.

However! It is an indiscriminate herbicide (kills every thing it touches) but at least it is systemic so treating individual plant is generally quite safe!

Sadly it is a banned substance meaning the public may have a problem getting some.

I got a bag about 25 years ago, and I still have around 1⁄2Kg left.

gray1720

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 658
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #18 on: March 25, 2021, 15:09:42 »
Good grief, how big was the bag?

Don't get it too hot, either - above 300C it decomposes into water and sodium chloride, and we all know how bad they are for us!
My garden is smaller than your Rome, but my pilum is harder than your sternum!

Tee Gee

  • Hectare
  • *****
  • Posts: 6,926
  • Huddersfield - Light humus rich soil
    • The Gardener's Almanac
Re: glysophate free weedkiller
« Reply #19 on: March 25, 2021, 17:39:08 »
As I recall it was around 10kg

 

SimplePortal 2.3.5 © 2008-2012, SimplePortal