Why this day and age the herbicides for lawns are still in use???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Okay, help me out. I generally agree with you and have never used fertilizer or weed control products -- but I bought some for the first time this year. Mowing simply does not get the spiky weeds or dandelions, as they just press down under the mower and stay put. I hand weed but it's an enormous amount of work and I can't keep up, especially if it rains every weekend as it so often does (can't mow in the rain either).

A couple years ago I bought a house with a pretty nice lawn. I did manual weeding and otherwise left it alone. Two years later it has been overrun with all kinds of weeds - they are not only ugly but not nice to walk on or play on. So what is the solution?

I grew up in a drought area and understand native plant gardens, but (a) that's not a playspace for kids and (b) weeding decorative planting beds or rock areas is even harder than weeding the lawn.

1. Horticultural vinegar
2. Add clover (I know it’s a cliche on here, but clover is a nitrogen fixing legume and you will make your soil healthier which means weeds are less likely)
3. Fill those flower beds all the way up with plants; weeds don’t grow where they don’t get light. Piet Oudolf gardens. Meadow gardens, meadow lawns. You can leave part of the lawn in traditional turf or make it all clover (but then you have to get rid of all the grass by smothering it or turning the soil over, so that’s a pain).
4. For the spring weed of your bed, get in there early and use a stirrup hoe.

Not PP, but- what is horticultural vinegar? Is it selective, or does it kill everything? We have added clover when overseeding our lawn, BUT do be warned that bees love the flowers. Not necessarily a bad thing! But at least once a year, I ended up getting stung on my foot walking around in flip flops. So something to consider when you have young kids.

Our lawn was not very healthy when we bought the house and within a couple years it was nearly a monoculture creeping charlie lawn. I hate that sh-t! Turns out it loves acidic, disturbed soil and a soil test revealed our soil was pretty acidic. We've applied herbicide a couple times now to knock it back, but also worked to improve soil health and overseed in the fall most years now. I don't need a perfect lawn, but I definitely don't want an exclusively invasive weed "lawn" either.

Horticultural vinegar is not selective, and it will kill many things (some things take repeated applications if you’re trying to kill them). It’s just insanely strong vinegar. Regular white vinegar is 5% acidity, hort vinegar can be 45% acidity.

And I LOVE creeping charlie. I love the smell, I love the purple flowers (so do the bees!). But they are invasive. https://hort.extension.wisc.edu/articles/creeping-charlie/

[Anonymous]

I have creeping Charlie too and while it’s insanely good at getting everywhere, I like the smell when I pull it and it’s not that hard to keep it in check. I find it’s perfectly mowable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree. I got rid of my lawn and replaced with pea gravel.

How do you keep weeds out of the pea gravel? I have weeks growing in my gravel.

[Anonymous]

you could try plastic bags underneath.

[Anonymous]

Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have creeping Charlie too and while it’s insanely good at getting everywhere, I like the smell when I pull it and it’s not that hard to keep it in check. I find it’s perfectly mowable.

Not hard to keep in check? When mixed in with your grass? I can pull it out of our flower beds easy enough but IME it is not easy to just randomly pull out of the lawn once it's everywhere. If you don't get all of the plant, it just grows back. The smell aggravates my allergies to no end!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

THis is at all proven. Other than the fact that it is lethal to weeds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

Is anyone really using round-up extensively on their lawns? I mean, it kills everything. We keep a bottle on hand for spot use- e.g., the occasional bit of poison ivy, or to treat the porclainberry stems that are growing up through the fence and impossible to pull out. I'm way more concerned about the proliferation of round-up use in agriculture than the occasional homeowner use. But then again maybe I'm not understanding how other homeowners use it.

[Anonymous]

why is anyone still driving around in fuel powered cars or using fuel powered cooking items to cook their food?

The exhaustf gets into the air, soil, drinking water..

Why are cities. schools. companies.private home owners still use them?

The environmental cost is unbelievable.

This is not 50s! In the climate and enwironment awarness this is unacceptable!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

Is anyone really using round-up extensively on their lawns? I mean, it kills everything. We keep a bottle on hand for spot use- e.g., the occasional bit of poison ivy, or to treat the porclainberry stems that are growing up through the fence and impossible to pull out. I'm way more concerned about the proliferation of round-up use in agriculture than the occasional homeowner use. But then again maybe I'm not understanding how other homeowners use it.

Landscaping companies do. I have a large yard and pay a company to help with weeding. Despite putting it in the contract that they are not to use roundoup, one company in particular sprayed so much, we could smell it throughout our house. It poisoned everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

Is anyone really using round-up extensively on their lawns? I mean, it kills everything. We keep a bottle on hand for spot use- e.g., the occasional bit of poison ivy, or to treat the porclainberry stems that are growing up through the fence and impossible to pull out. I'm way more concerned about the proliferation of round-up use in agriculture than the occasional homeowner use. But then again maybe I'm not understanding how other homeowners use it.

Landscaping companies do. I have a large yard and pay a company to help with weeding. Despite putting it in the contract that they are not to use roundoup, one company in particular sprayed so much, we could smell it throughout our house. It poisoned everything.

Round Up is illegal in most countries. Not the U.S., because Monsato.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree OP. We’re obsessed with perfect lawns at the expense of our health and the environment.

+1

The whole "perfect appearance" idea has been taken to new levels, and people that use Round Up and herbicides are too stupid or selfish to care.

Kardashians gone awry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:why is anyone still driving around in fuel powered cars or using fuel powered cooking items to cook their food?

The exhaustf gets into the air, soil, drinking water..

Why are cities. schools. companies.private home owners still use them?

The environmental cost is unbelievable.

This is not 50s! In the climate and enwironment awarness this is unacceptable!!!

I bet you try this same whataboutism over on the gun threads when there’s a mass shooting.

Chemicals have their place; I would use Roundup on poison ivy. But the attempt to grow perfectly green, monoculture lawns using any and all chemicals is pointless. No one gets anything out of it, and the only person allowed to play on the perfect lawn is the pudgy white man who is obsessed with it. It’s an absolutely pointless use of chemicals that harms the environment and the people living in it.

[Anonymous]

Pesticides are 100% proven link to Parkinsons Disease, at a minimum, and likely many more neurologic disorders.

Id rather a lawn of clover then watch others die the way my mom did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Round Up is lethal and not good for humans either

Is anyone really using round-up extensively on their lawns? I mean, it kills everything. We keep a bottle on hand for spot use- e.g., the occasional bit of poison ivy, or to treat the porclainberry stems that are growing up through the fence and impossible to pull out. I'm way more concerned about the proliferation of round-up use in agriculture than the occasional homeowner use. But then again maybe I'm not understanding how other homeowners use it.

Landscaping companies do. I have a large yard and pay a company to help with weeding. Despite putting it in the contract that they are not to use roundoup, one company in particular sprayed so much, we could smell it throughout our house. It poisoned everything.

That's awful. I hope they paid to replace all of your plants!