This video is an update on our quackgrass situation. As many of you know, we’ve been dealing with this rhizomatous grass in our garden for several years at this point. So last year we decided to cover some of our growing area with silage tarps. Now, after a full year, let’s see if it worked.
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Very informative, thanks for the update! I like the idea of reusing a commercial farmer's trash, not something I would have thought about. Another channel that I follow is Red Gardens, and they recently made a quick video about weed control using homemade tools. There's something that I find really satisfying about others' garden pest control methods.
you should try animals, especially pigs and chickens. I recall farmers using animals to clear land and fertilize prior to growing. Add this step to the rotation … here's an example vid from a couple years ago.
How 2 Pigs + 30 Chickens Prepped my Garden (15 minutes)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOd6tcorJAA
Can you show what kind of gate you have with the fence & how keep critters out?
We don't have quack grass here in New Mexico, we have Bermuda, which is just as much a pain. Spreads through rhizomes into every crack it can find. But the soil is such crap quality for gardening that I built raised beds. A high quality weed barrier and the boxes being 2 feet deep from ground to top and thankfully that grass cant get through.
Don’t forget that those tarps work very well for slip n slides
As you have seen, nature always wins in the human attempts to make "war on weeds". Whenever it appears, quackgrass is doing a serious and important function in the ecosystem. Like every other plant, this one only grows when the conditions are right for it – compacted soil, probably more clay-like than sandy, which is always more acid than alkaline (not enough air; not enough drainage; not enough organic matter) that lacks a healthy, balanced ecosystem of micro-organisms which would make it well-structured and full of humus. A well structured soil is able to breathe AND retain humidity, draining the excess water and letting plant roots move easily through the soil. Quackgrass will not grow in such soil…. Where it does grow, it creates tunnels in the compacted soil with its roots (sometimes several feet deep) which eventually become compost corridors where micro-organisms thrive. Quackgrass is contributing to the regeneration of your soil. Change the conditions of your soil and the quackgrass will not grow. Learn how to do that here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSAU5ludwNyqMHBaR1ZfheQ
The grass invaders I deal with here have long deep taproots, kinda like dandelions. If you leave any of the taproot behind, the grass is coming up later. I have two beds I covered with at least a foot of grass clipping mulch last fall, and the weeds just laughed at me…
On the solarization aspect, we have some cold frames we use for wintering over some of our plants. We've recently pulled them out to try an experiment: We are using them like mini-composters. When we pull the weeds, we dump them, roots and all, in the cold frames, then close the lid. The sun bakes them throughout the day, killing the roots. We hope to be left with some usable compost — or at least some usable mulch — by the start of fall when the garlic goes back in.
My method for killing unwanted plants is to tape a propane torch to a hockey stick and walk around every few weeks causing the plant to atrophy.
Yes! I had terrible quackgrass last year, so much so that I also just cut my losses on a large section of my yard. I 1st dug a 6 inch deep trench around the perimeter of the garden, as apparently the rhizomes air prune. I then put a silage tarp for the entire growing season. In the spring I put my chickens on the area for the entire spring until last frost (may 24) the chickens seemed to till up all the rhizomes to the surface where I either raked them away or the fried in the sun. I’m incredibly pleased with that result. So much so I’m duplicating it this year on another portion where I’m putting the chickens on an area then moving them after a month, putting down fresh sheep bedding and tarping for months then bringing the chickens back in, I’m rotating 3 areas like this.
such an adventure!
I just cooked a pot of stew but it turned out one of the cans of beans that I bought last week was spoiled :((
Ugh, same problem here in Manitoba! I tried cardboard, but that didn't cut it. I'll have to try the black tarp method and see. However, it does have its benefit for our animals- the geese love it, so I've been letting them graze certain areas of the garden where there are raised beds and they can't get at the veggies. As well, I pull it out for the rabbits. Outside of the garden, the goats are really keeping it at bay in other areas- saves cutting it and free feed!
No. It will grow under a strong. I used newspaper, 30 sheets and then DG, then cardboard, then a tarp.
Very encouraging. Thank you for taking the time to document this!
We put cardboard over our lawns with bricks on top. After a couple months we were able to remove the cardboard, rake and break up the soil under the cardboard and reseed. Of course this was just for our city lot sized lawn.
The yearly kids swimming pool always killed off the tuff grass then i would turn and plant
Now i use cardboard and mulch but it will grow through eventually
So i got goats lol crazy grass
I always look forward to you videos
So many "how to" videos show people telling what they intend to do, not what they have actually tried. I love the fact you showed the results of a tested process rather than pretending to be an expert prior to knowing the actual result.
Perhaps use the tarp with a bucket with its bottom cut out used as a barrier against the quackgrass from mixing with the roots of your crop. I can't imagine that the rhizomes from the quackgrass go deeper than 6 inches into the soil.
I tried organic methods for quack grass for a few years and it just didn't work. This year I've used clethodim (a selective herbicide for grassy weeds) and the quack grass has all but vanished.
Nice, thanks for sharing! For us, our lemon balm has been its own excellently spreading, well surviving weed. Although it sure does smell nice 🙂
Thanks for sharing your progress!
I had natural paths last year too, and spent a week or so, "re-edging," them last spring. I created a nice pile of sod/soil that I removed and covered it with a tarp, then decided that was the last time I wanted to do that. The soil that was the sod became a really nice pile of topsoil, but it has some seeds in it that germinate when I've used it as potting mix. I picked up a good pile of neighbors leaf bags last fall and slit them open on the sides to lay them out as a paper barrier as well as to spread the leaves, (etc.,) out on the paths. So far I've had to find and add some extra paper and mulch for much of the edges, where the beds meet the paths, but the grass, (along with sheep sorrel, creeping charlie, wood sorrel, yarrow, and others,) seems to be fading.
Thank you for sharing. I have used sheets of black plastic to kill off weeds and unwanted vegetation in the past. I live in Ohio so perhaps where you live in Canada does not get enough sunlight to kill off the vegetation. I left the black plastic bare and found that a few warm sunny days was sufficient to kill pretty much everything but I was not killing quack grass. Thank you,
We have had great success with silage tarp on our beds, but similar problems with it coming in around the perimeter of the garden.
Another great video! we have this problem with mint lol. It is everywhere on our property and although we do hate to try to kill it, we can only transplant so much and …. as you know with these types of plants, the more you pull it out the more it grows back. We may have to try the tarp method as we are near kingstom/brockville, so similar climate and therefor I am sure it would be a similar die off time. Thanks so much for sharing!
Hello, I used a tarp and I dug a ditch 6 inch deep arounds. The rhizome will not pass the ditch and I left the tarp more then 8 months. Another way for small beds is to remove all the soil up to 6 inch depth, sifted and remove all rhizomes. After dug a 6 inch depth ditch around the bed so the other rhizomes will not passing to your bed.It is a lot of work but had best results in short time.
As far as this grass that spreads through rhizomes, does anyone know how to tell which one you have… quackgrass, bermuda, etc.? I live in central Michigan, zone 4. We've gotten as cold as -22°F in winter and as high as the upper 90's in the summer (with, like, 95% humidity also!). We pretty much live on a pile of sand as far as our soil goes. Between this dang grass and voles, I'm about ready to give up!
I'm a new subscriber and have only had time to watch a few of your videos, but every one I've watched has been so great! You put a lot of effort in communicating what you want to get across and it definitely shows! Just as I'm thinking of a question, you seem to answer it in your next sentence! I also love your clear, and funny, animations. Great job!