Its all in the weeds!!

[cornykev]

The last time I fed them was with chicken pellets about three or four weeks ago, I moved some of the soil from around the bulbs and was surprised that some have actually bulbed but not as big as my winter ones, I was just surprised that they seemed to have gone yellow and floppy in a matter of days, when the winter ones still have greenery in the stalks.  :-\  ???    ;D ;D ;D

[cornykev]

[Meg]

Will have to admit that my lovely weed free strawberry plants are looking fab but no strawberries!!!!! As for the ones covered in weeds......they taste really good!!!!!

[GodfreyRob]

One problem I see with constantly weeding the onion patch is that you can't help but disturb the onion roots - and a lot of weed seeds seem to germinate right next to the bulbs (maybe there is a little more moisture there?). I might give the 'no weed' a go next year.

I like to look on weeds as a useful crop to put on the compost heap - just make sure you 'harvest' them before they start flowering. A lot of weeds have long taproots and absorb lots of minerals from the soil - might as well make use of the free crop.

[tonybloke]

I also only grow two types of crop, 1.food for me. 2. food for the land (compost). Most weed seeds 'dormancy coat' is broken by abrasion (think of sweet peas) any movement in the soil will cause this to happen (poppies on battle grounds/ fat hen when a tree falls over.etc) too much hoeing can cause more weeds.  ;)

[Robert_Brenchley]

If you put a decent layer of organic mulch over onion sets when you plant, that keeps the weeds down till late in the growing cycle, when weeding isn't so important. Then just pull out anything which is approaching the flowering stage. You won't get too many weeds anyway, as the ground hasn't been disturbed.

[tonybloke]

I also find that a good stand of weeds helps keep the birds off of my gooseberries, there's no easy access to underside of bush.