please help an allotment newbie

hi clueless,

i agree that bindweed is a real problem, i fight against it constantly at work - i'd rather have himlayan balsam any day, though maybe not knotweed. I am not sure how much there is on the plot - it hasn't started coming up yet - but some of the things I am digging up look very suspicious....

i am not against glyphosate, so will be spraying if absolutely necessary. Have heard Bob Flowerdew talking about the blowtorch method, any ideas if that is any good?

 

I've waged war on it twice nice (two separate gardens), and I'm told by my former neighbour that there's still no bindweed in my former garden over a year on. I found it in my new garden and waged war here too. We're now in the second year of BWW2 and I have it pinned down.

On both occasions, I used/am using Roundup. I tried lots of things, and eventually honed my skills I did a lot of research as I went along, and did a lot of experimentation too. I found that just blitzing it with RoundUp is the answer. Blitz indiscriminately over the affected area, and don't follow the instructions. One treatment doesn't do it, nor two, no matter what the label implies. It needs to be blitzed at least once per week. When it appears to be dead, cut it back to close to ground level, and then just watch it. It will come back. As it does, target it on sight with the roundup. Keep at it, and don't disturb the ground until you're sure its gone.

As for other methods, I can't say categorically that they don't work. I'm not an expert enough to say that. However whenever I've read of other methods, there has always been a caveat that its an ongoing battle for years. Burning off the top growth will do nothing unless you have access to the whole plant, which you wont have because a lot of it will be on your neighbour's land, and all connected by the same network of roots. So while all the top growth on your side is burned off, the top growth outside your jurisdiction will be photosynthesising away happily, maintaining enough energy in to the massive network of roots to send up lots of new shoots on your side. That said, I guess if you can burn the surface of the ground with enough heat, at least you'll burn off all the seeds down to a depth of a few millimeters.

 

Thanks Clueless - looks like i'm in it for the long haul.......

 

Ours was'nt predug so thank your lucky stars for that Em, saves a lot of backache,

We had ton upon ton of couchgrass to remove. We dug out what we could then turned the soil to let frost get to it, just leave in lumps.

When the first earlies (potatoes) could be planted they cleaned up the couchgrass too.

Try to buy the manure old or store it under ploythene for 12 months till it 'smokes' and is packed with lovely worms.

Make a 'swag bag of manure on a stick, place it over a bucket, when it rains you'll have liquid manure.

Plant away.