E-Edition
Sign up for email newsletters
Sign up for email newsletters
E-Edition
Trending:
Spring is in full swing and blossoms are popping up all over. But as our beautiful flowers and crops grow, so does the pesky plant – weeds! While tending to your garden or lawn this season, try this non-toxic option for a safer and natural weed elimination.
What is an organic herbicide?
Weed-killers, also known as herbicides, are chemicals used to manipulate or control undesirable vegetation. These chemicals can be either organic or inorganic, depending on the compounds they consist of. Organic herbicides are created from chemicals that are naturally occurring and inorganic weed killers are manufactured in a lab. While organic herbicides are becoming more and more popular, they’re availability is lower than that of their synthetically created kind, but luckily, this is changing quickly and more products are available every year. If you want to take a homemade approach, there is a lot of information online of concoctions you can create. Some common main ingredients of the organic variety include corn gluten meal, vinegar, citric acid, citrus terpenes and essential oils.
You can find organic herbicide at your local hardware store, such as Ace. I have yet to find one product that jumps out as a clear leader in this category, so my recommendation is trial and error with your specific situation. Different climates, varieties of weeds and your personal goals will drive your decision making on this journey.
As a landscape maintenance provider, we are often asked to not use Roundup or other types of synthetic chemicals on our client’s properties. These organic herbicides can be partially effective in commercial use, however it requires additional labor to maintain a weed-free environment. If you are asking your landscape service provider for an all-organic program be prepared to pay slightly more and if you aren’t paying more for organic, make sure to audit your service provider to ensure they truly are providing an organic program.
Herbicides work by halting the metabolic process in the plant, causing dieback and optimistically, death. There are two classes of weed-killers in relation to how they disturb the plant.
Systemic herbicides work from the inside of the weed’s vascular system after being absorbed. The poison is spread through the entire plant all the way down to the roots.
Contact herbicides only affect the plant in the areas it has touched. Organic herbicides are classified as “contact” weedkillers and while they are usually quick to do their job, they may require several applications to destroy the entire plant. Use caution, as organic herbicides are not discriminatory – they will kill any vegetation they come in contact with.
• Temperatures above 75 degrees and where there is direct sunlight will host better results.
• Coat the entire plant, the herbicide will only work where it comes in contact.
• Use in combination with hand weeding.
• Try to hit new, young plants on their first leaf stages.
Protect your edible plants, pets, wild critters and the people of your home or property by adapting this environmentally-friendly approach to the fight against weeds. And if that doesn’t work, call in the goats!
Justin White is the CEO of K&D Landscaping, headquartered in Watsonville, CA and awarded “2020 Business of the Year” by the Pajaro Valley Chamber of Commerce. White is the preceding President of the central coast chapter California Landscape Contractors Association (CLCA). He is also involved with several, non-profit organizations throughout the community. For more information on landscaping, outdoor and garden needs, contact K&D Landscaping at kndlandscaping.com.
Sign up for email newsletters
We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. We reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law, regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.
Copyright © 2022 MediaNews Group
