Sneezleweed As the bible says, “To every thing there is a season … a time to plant and …a time to weed.” Okay, I’m paraphrasing Ecclesiastes 3 a little bit, because, as far as I know, the bible says nothing directly about weeding. But this is a good time to get started on your weeding program. ‘Tis the season.

Everybody has weeds, and most gardeners are both self conscious and apologetic about theirs. But they shouldn’t be: weeds are omnipresent, inevitable and persistent. Good gardener or bad, weeds show up about now to keep us humble – and they will take over any garden that is left alone.

There are two basic types: annual weeds that are sprouting in my garden even as I type this, and perennial weeds that live from year to year – things like dandelions and thistles and many creeping grasses. Good gardeners try very hard to pull the perennial weeds, though frankly many gardeners waste considerable time by pulling perennial weeds ineffectively. They pull weeds but leave part of the root in the ground. That scrap of root will be back to plague you, if you don’t get it out.

What should you do? First, get rid of the annual weeds because they’re so easy. They’re babies now, just producing their first leaves. Use a sharp hoe to cut their stems at ground level (slicing off the leaves) and the weeds will die. I like the “stirrup hoe” because it can slice off weeds without disturbing the soil. Some garden centers sell them, and they are available from Johhny’s Selected Seeds of Maine (www.johnnyseeds.com or 877- 564-6697).

I cover my vegetable garden with leaves each fall that I sucked up with my lawn mower and caught in a bagger. Earlier this spring I raked the leaves off the raised beds and into the walkways, allowing the soil to dry out and warm up. This also allowed weed seeds to germinate. That’s good. I want them to germinate now – so I can kill them before they compete with my lettuce and tomatoes later on.

Weed seeds are everywhere. Some are tiny and arrived on breezes last summer or fall. Some floated downhill in rivulets created by rains. Some seeds have been lurking in the soil for a long time – years, even decades. The seeds in the soil are collectively called the seed bank. Seeds in the bank will wait until they are near the surface of the soil –brought up by a rototiller or a hoe – to germinate. Many have photo-triggers that keeps them dormant until they are near the soil surface and sense light.

Perennial weeds are tough to eradicate, and a few impossible. Goutweed, Creeping Charlie (ground ivy), witch grass and horsetail (Equisetum) are very persistent – even if you try herbicides, which I don’t recommend.

So how can you eradicate them? First, try digging them out (even though Japanese knotweed has roots that can go down 8 feet into the earth and goutweed roots can survive 5 years without any sunshine). Reducing a weed’s root mass and minimizing the amount of sunshine it gets can help to reduce its vigor. Covering persistent weeds to block out the sun will help considerably if you have the patience to cover the soil for a year or more.

A garden fork is a good weeding tool – for a first step. Loosen the soil with a rocking motion and roots are easier to loosen and extract. But pulling big weeds by hand is not realistic. You need something that can get under the roots, something to lift them out while you pull with the other hand. The best tool I’ve found is the CobraHead weeder (www.CobraHead.com or 866- 962-6272). Shaped like a tine out of an old cultivator, it acts like a steel finger, loosening roots or teasing out long grass roots without breaking them off.

Whatever weeding tool you choose, weed when the soil is moist. Dry soil, particularly dry soil with a preponderance of clay, makes getting all the roots out very difficult. Sandy soil? Piece of cake – weed anytime.

Good gardeners recognize weeds and try hard to prevent them from flowering. Even if you have no time for extracting weeds, snap off flowers or seed heads before the seeds get dispersed. Some big clumps of weeds (purple loosestrife for one) can literally produce millions of seeds, or so I have read. And each one can wait for its chance to grow in your garden!

My late sister, Ruth Anne Mitchell, a great gardener, often said, “The weeds always win.” She said that because weed seeds can wait practically forever before germinating, and gardeners have kids, dogs, jobs, and the occasional crisis. We aren’t always attentive to weeds. Turn your back on them and they’re back in your garden. My recommendation? Pull weeds every day for a few minutes. Make it a habit, like brushing your teeth. If you do, you might just beat those weeds. Let me know if you win.

Henry Homeyer may be reached at henry.homeyer@comcast. net or P.O. Box 364, Cornish Flat, NH 03746