I've had two darleks smouldering nicely ever since I moved into this place. About a week ago I decided that they were cooked enough and turned them out, riddled and covered two empty raised beds with the stuff.
Looked lovely, didn't smell, nice and soft, brown and tasty.
Sowed some carrits and radishes in said beds just to fill up the space like, and what have I found today ? MILLIONS of weed seedlings !!!!!!!!!!
I'm more than a little peed off by this as all the beds had been relatively weed free up til now as they were filled with mostly imported compost when I started the plot.
Of course the carrits haven't come up so I can't hoe around them as I didn't mark them seed by seed.
What should I have done to avoid this self harm! Waiting two years for the stuff was bad enough, but the thought of microwaving several hundred litres of compost is just too much.
Yours disillusionedly.
:-\
I've had a lot of that. my response is to cover everything with grass cuttings as soon as possible after disturbing it. That way i can keep the weeds at bay relatively painlessly. There are a few that come straight up through a couple of inches of grass, but fortunatdly not many seeds can do that.
Wotta bu**er Kaypers :(
Commiserations and hugs :)
thanks Robert! lawn cutting today it is then ! looks reasonably dryish out there.
if only i'd actually sowed the seeds, i'd be happy !! lmao
do you think they'd be edible if i let them grow?
;D
Another way to look at it Mrs KP - those weed seedlings are green manure. Let them grow to a couple of inches, pluck em out and compost em.
Excellent stress relief - honest ;)
beats biting my nails i guess.
;D
Same problem here - coriander and cherry tomatos growing from seed in all my tubs. Why can't it be lettuce or something else that I actually like?
Was once told by a neighbour never to put buddleia clippings for compost - seeds last forever apparently, so if you've done that KP, the good news might be that you'll have a cloud of butterflies next year....you like butterflies, don't you? ::)
This is to be expected I would say, compost made at home will not be sterile like shop bought stuff, you can sterilise it but it would be a big job to do an entire "dalek" of compost.
The way around it would be to make what is known as a "stale seed bed" a few weeks before you want to sow your veg. This is where you prepare a seed bed by digging it over (and in your case adding home compost) and preparing it for sowing but DON'T sow anything in it, leave it for the weeds to appear and then hoe it over to remove them, THEN you can sow your chosen plant/veg into the bed with the knowledge that the weeds have gone ... for now! ;D
If you put "stale seed bed" into google there are sites that will tell you more.
bit late not to sow anything GW, but i won't sow anything MORE and just keep irritating the little darlinks until they give up the ghost!!!
the stuff is lovely and friable though so it is quite therapeutic just giving it the odd shoogle with the hand rake lmao
sadly no buddlea Lish. Infact i haven't got a clue what they could be, i mean almost everything goes in the darleks so i suppose almost everything will come back out lmao
I've got these two beds marked down for extending the strawberry patch, so i'll just carry on shoggling until i need it. will put the perpetual spinach somewhere else.
;D
Don't put tomatos into the compost - those seeds will survive anything, and will come up with 100 percent gertmination (unlike some expensive packet seeds!)
if they're toms i bet they ripen quicker than the ones in the g/house.
;D
yep, we had toms suddenly appear in flower beds , obviously from home compost!! ;D
OK i've made a resolution, whatever survives the shoogle, get's eaten.
;D
;D ;D ;D
FAB idea, you know you've probably just started a new garden style!!! Just throw loads of home made compost around, leave it alone for a month or 2 and harvest whatever crops come up!!! The way this summer is going you'll probably have more luck! ::)
i knew there was a gardener in me somewhere :P
we made the mistake last year when we werent growing any veggies cos of our wedding reception and honeymoon to throw loads of flower seeds into the beds and just see what came up for the august event, what a nightmare it has proved to be this year no end of weeds, however where i extended the beds no weeds hardly at all so much for my 'fallow' >:( year!
Just to hark back to the original topic, Mrs. K.P, if you`ve got a lawn then your mowings would do you far more good in the compost bin. Thoroughly mixed 50/50 with weeds and other green stuff (leave some soil on the weed roots) and watered with the contents of the `gosunder` the bin will generate enough heat to kill off all the weed seeds - and yes, it will kill off tomato seeds as well. And you won`t have to wait 2 years for it, either.
won't it go slodgy ? i've been ear marking the grass cuttings for mulch as I have precious little of them.
i could actually fill one of the bins now and see what happens i suppose.
in the meantime i'll just keep shoggling.
;D
If you don`t go higher than 50/50 (and cover the bin) it shouldn`t go soggy, but use the mowings and weeds while they are still fresh. Often the heat generated will actually dry out the contents a bit too much - which is where the `gosunder` comes in. Even if you`re too generous with the mowings, and it stays a bit wet, you can always mix in a few more weeds to balance it.
and a bit of shredded news paper
hope screwed up newspaper will do. ::)
thanks peeps.
;D