Is it safe to use a "round-up" like product around the base of young fruit trees to control grass?
I really don't like using pesticides, so why don't you try mulching? Here are some good resources:
http://www.homeorchardsociety......tum/?id=47
http://www.homeorchardsociety......rticle/18/
If you ever want to be "Certifiably Organic," you might give herbicides a second thought. Mulch can work, if you can come up with enough of it to totally smother the grass. After many years of hand cultivating, to running the largest Troy-built tiller around mine - unavoidably hitting roots with either method - I tried "Round-up."
One carefully measured application (they keep increasing the concentration of their larger containers, you must really do your math to keep from overdosing the soil) every-other year has worked well. The toughest of weeds will do their best, just scrape them off, but the grass stays gone at least 2 years.
It's few people's method of choice, but I'm OK with it.
Round-up, used in normal concentrations, should not have any effect on soil. Just make sure you have no overspray onto anything you don't want to kill (other than holly, which unfortunately seems to be too waxy to be affected). I was very nervous about using nasty herbicides, but was reassured by an equally concerned biologist that this stuff won't mess with soil or destroy the beneficial guys living in it.
(Grass is the most pernicious weed I know, but that's another subject.)
Well, I have been working in my garden for a long time and I have learnt that chemical products aren’t the best solution. Thus, I got involved in the organic wave but I got disappointed when I learnt that organic herbicides are expensive. After that, I began to research and I found that it is possible to make homemade organic herbicides. I got to know vinegar can be used to destroy son types of grass, as well as Corn gluten meal. There are also other common products that can be use herbicides. In any case, round up like products may work, but they have to be used carefully.
Be careful with round up on a hot day it can volatilize and get your tree as well. Herbicide's can be a good strategy and there are four kinds to consider. Systemic like round up, grass specific, and pre-emergents each have their advantages for example the grass specific herbicides can't harm broad leaf plants or trees. Broad leaf herbicides probably shouldn't be used, trees are broad leafed. The pre-emergents do just that they only get new growth just as it tries to go through the soil surface, existing woody plants are not harmed.
The propane torch is a good organic method, nobody said Organic was low carbon foot print, and you only have to heat the weeds not burn them up.
Randy
Yamhill County Master Gardener
The most effective method I've used is to put newspaper thickly or cardboard down near the tree but , say, one foot away from the roots. Then cover it with some inexpensive mulch, like, say, free wood chips from tree cutting companies. The best time to do this, in my opinion, is October or November, so the rains stay on them, to prevent light from getting to the weeds for many months in a row. It works for me and I do it every year. I don't have to do it on such a large scale anymore.
This process is organic, and therefore it builds soil microbiology, which is what your tree needs. Synthetic herbicides kill the soil life, which can set your garden up for unbalanced biology, and therefore devastating attacks by particular pests, like aphids, etc.
John S
PDX OR
Idyllwild
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jafar
Marsha H
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