Need to Weed?

Hi folks,
Darren here from Melbourne, Australia where it's been a fairly tame summer.

I'm renting a place that has a 49m² lot which I've been trying to grow veg on with some success.

Some veg appears to have struggled and while there could be many reasons, I wonder if its because of the weeds I let grow.

I can't yet afford the $100 - $150 to mulch all the beds so as a natural mulch I let short weeds cover the ground. I did this after listening to a podcast on zero tillage and thought it may be okay to let weeds grow provided there was sufficient nutrients, light, and the weeds weren't of the kind that release chemicals to stunt veg growth.

I have for instance grasses growing through the tomatoe bed. The toms are coming along but they are quite slow. I haven't yet done a soil test but the soil seems okay.

Is there something explicitly about weeds that can damage veg?

I have about 200m of drip line set to auto water in the morning and arvo which judging by local seasonal weather and my soil type is okay.

Here are some photos. I intend to shell out for mulch soon. Very interested if the zero tillage thing really does let weeds serve as a natural mulch.







Thanks!
Darren

 

Welcome Darren

I'll be watching your thread with interest as I have a similar issue on an allotment I've just taken on.

 

welcome

 

My personal thoughts are that growing weeds will never act as a mulch, they are taking up moisture and nutrient, so competing with your plants.

You dont need mulch in order to keep weeds down, you need to go round with a hoe, between plants, once every couple of weeks and cut off the weeds below ground.

 

Welcome to GC Darren. Pete is right, weeds will take away from your plants everything they need to establish themselves.

Are there horse stables near you? Quite often the owners will be happy for you to take away manure free of charge and this will do wonders for your veg. It's best to mulch with this during the winter months before you start growing.

 

Hi Darren, I use the 'no dig' method modified to suit my needs. I cut down any existing weeds as low as possible, usually by mowing (though this probably isn't strictly necessary) and then lay down cardboard, butting up close to plants but not touching their stems. I plant in beds of a width where I can reach to the middle from either side and never walk on the cultivated bit, having grass walkways between. I pile anything organic onto the cardboard, manure, lots of grass mowings, veg waste from the kitchen, finished crops, green manure. It doesn't have to be rotted first (except the animal poo). The worms do the work. Weeds are easy to pull out, and i just put another layer of cardboard whenever necessary. The local shops have free cardboard boxes here, so I never have a problem when I need more cardboard, just pick some up when I do the shopping.... Newspaper works too, but needs pinning down with mulch more quickly to stop it blowing around. We have quite a lot of rain here overwinter and in the spring, but sometimes the cardboard might need soaking if it goes down in a dry spell. Once under any mulch this isn't usually needed.
This method keeps the moisture in and nutrients available to the plant without the competition from weeds.
It isn't exactly a traditional approach, but works for me as no digging or hoeing necessary.

 

just thinking you might find a local green grocers wit waste vegetable material they'd like to get rid of, which might come in handy as mulch?
There is someone close to me who uses the weeds as a natural mulch, but she is growing herbs and other plants that need low levels of nutrients.

 

We also mulched our allotment last year with newspaper, wetted down with a watering can and covered in grass clippings. Then in the autumn mulched all our beds with spent mushroom compost from a local farm. This is great if you can get it as the compost is already well rotted, mixed with straw and leaf mulch, and pasteurised to get rid of weed seeds. Plus it's cheap as they need to get rid of it to make room for the next batch - we took a tonne off them for £15.

 

I was minded to return to this thread last night. Last season was our first on our allotment and we spent a lot of time digging over the heavy clay soil. Once plants were in we mulched as much as we could, limited only by how much grass clippings/compost/wood chip/straw we could get our hands on.

So last night I was down the allotment after work doing some digging, getting ready for the new season. With the recent heavy rain expecting the soil to be unworkable. I was really pleased to find that the areas we had mulched I could turn over just with a light forking, the soil was super crumbly and the beds almost ready to go already. It really works!