Allotments 4 All

The top half of the lottie we got a year ago is so over grown we pretty much left it alone & consentrated on the doable lower half with great success! ( Well, we thought so anyway)  :)

The ground is quite un-yielding & it's full of either couch grass or some other even tougher plant that's prolific in there.

I would hate to loose it for another year, but we just don't have the time (or inclination) to dig over the whole lot. And even if we did we'd have a skip full of heavy clods of earth, bound by tough old roots!

What are we to do?  ???

several possibilities. For starters:
Cover it with plastic or old carpet (but that takes time)
Use weedkiller (glysophate) and then rotovate (organic gardeners would throw their hands up in horror but even Alan Titchmarsh recommends it in extremis).
Rotovate and remove weeds by hand/ rake.

Remove top layer and build into a heap face down to rot. Apply lots of compost and/ or manure and plant.

Hi Bun, hope this help,
three ways - remark out your beds to manageable size plots, start to double dig one plot ever year and place in loads of well rotted manure, remove any problem weeds as you go, this way you'll help with your crop rotation, drainage of your soil,
burn off weeds with flamegun, you can higher them, them cover with black plastic for 6-8 mounths, uncover, single dig, add manure and see what regrows, may have to do a couple of times,
or use chemicals, and leave for 6 mounths, may have to do a couple of times,
windy

We had a similar problem when the allotment we inherited was half lawned over, (unfortunately with couch grass).  As has been suggested, we found the best method, (if you don't want to use chemicals) is to cover it. We marked our beds out, covered them with either weed suppressant fabric or carpet, this does weaken the weeds and grass and makes it a lot easier to dig out.  It was very hard work but we managed to turn it over bed by bed, and have only a small area at the back of our plot that is wild now, which we hope to get rid of this year. At least when it is covered it stops new weeds growing and weakens the rest and looks a lot tidier. It has taken us over two years though, so you have to be patient.

Another idea, if you have seen "The Allotments" video is to cover the beds with black plastic; cutting planting holes in the plastic, dig out weed debri from the hole and fill with top soil, or compost and plant some veg in.  In this way you can have your cake and eat it by growing veggies, improving the quality of the soil  and the weeds underneath are still rotting away.  Hopefully by next season you will have an easier time digging it  all over and you have had some lovely produce.  Didn't do ours this way but it seems a feasable idea. busy_lizzie

Or you could try a combination of all of the above: Strim the weeds down, buy some porous black plastic and cover the ground (it's about a quid a metre). Plant spuds through the plastic in part of the area, and any other veg you fancy trying, and ignore for a couple of months. Then uncover a tiny patch at a time for digging over. It won't seem anywhere near as daunting if you're only attempting, say, two foot by six foot each time.

I'm presuming you can't or won't get a rotovator in there. While many hate the very idea of them, they can be useful. My plot was very overgrown and was cleared and rotovated before I took it on. I couldn't afford much black plastic so I sowed a green manure  (rye grass) on part of the plot. It's kept down the weeds and hopefully will enrich the soil when I dig it in, though I do get laughed at for having half plot half football pitch.

Thanks for all your ideas. I'm sure OH would like the flame gun aproach!  :o

Would I put the weed killer on now or wait till spring?

Wait until the weeds are growing strongly, around April/May

If you are going to use Glyphosate wait till spring when the plants are growing quite quickly. You need the weeds to have a fair amount of leaf growth on them since I think Glyphosate works by being taken in through the leaves of plants and down to the roots. It triggers the growth mechanisms so that the plants 'outgrow' their own energy reserves. If its persistant you sometimes need to give the area two treatments a few weeks apart. (I put a couple of drops of washing up liquid in the water to act as a wetting agent, which means that more solution sticks to the plant and less gets wasted running onto the soil).

Quote from: John_H on January 16, 2006, 18:34:53
I think Glyphosate works by being taken in through the leaves of plants and down to the roots. It triggers the growth mechanisms so that the plants 'outgrow' their own energy reserves.

Yes, Glyphosate works by causing the plant cells to rapidly reproduce so quickly, that they literally explode... This is how it was described to me last year on an RHS course.  It only affects plants and as soon as it touches the soil it becoems inactive...  G does take 2-3 weeks before you see it has taken effect, be patient and the plants will die!

I used glyphosate on a patch of horsetail in my garden when i moved in.  I read the instructions and used the extra strength dose for woody plants (as horsetail is persistent) within 3 weeks the horsetail was dead and has never returned...
mat

I hope you are right about the Glyphosate and Mares Tail Mat, as I had a battle with Mares Tail last year and used very strong Glyphosate. It did appear to kill it but I have been told it will come back. The Council had previously sprayed it with no result. I do hope this has worked.

Rosemary

Quote from: Rose.mary on January 16, 2006, 22:46:04
I hope you are right about the Glyphosate and Mares Tail Mat, as I had a battle with Mares Tail last year and used very strong Glyphosate. It did appear to kill it but I have been told it will come back. The Council had previously sprayed it with no result. I do hope this has worked.

Rosemary

Well, I used it 13 years ago and it has never come back...  I did make  up a strong solution though (woody/bramble strength (and maybe a teeny bit more))  and maybe I was just lucky.  If I remember rightly, the version I bought was tumbleweed, I think there's still some in the shed...

mat

When I asked the council guys on my site they said to use Roundup at double the recommended strength + a squirt of washing up liquid

When i took on my allotment 5 years ago it was pretty overgrown. All i did was clear the weeds off the top using a spade and a bit of welly, pile them up and burn them.

Then just dug it as normal, pulling out bindweed and couch grass roots as i went, the rest of the roots and what was left of the tops were just dug in.

So long as you do this early enough it has all winter to break down ready for planting in the spring, might be a bit late now but i'd still have a go.