Weeding, The never ending story...

You can see them little devils creeping in, them weeds!

The weeds are again trying to take over the garlic...row by row. I always say I will never mulch with straw again. I always do because I have nothing else when I plant to mulch with until leaf fall. Then I spend a month grinding leaves, that don't have seeds.

Wheat straw and most other straw products are fraught with seed...which co exists with the garlic till mid March, and them  little seed begin to compete for sun, moisture and nutrients with my garlic.Wimpy stuff, garlics. They wither at the sight of competition for anything. yet they stand in 10 inches of snow and laugh at cold. They do not try to fight the weeds. Garlic just whines, and I HATE WHINING. Although, I do a bit myself...about weeding.

The answer to this dilemma is to weed each row of it's seasonal pest as it springs up. Yes, weeds are not selective about competition. One kind can come up and another will sprout right up with it a week later...they seem to enjoy each others company. The garlic just whines.

The bad part comes after I weed all 15 rows which are 100 feet long. I then ask for trouble by spraying the garlic with fish emulsion, a smelly liquid that a cave lady wouldn't wear, The garlic stop whimpering and goes to growing...only trouble is, the weeds go to growing, too...with vengeance...requiring another weeding. This goes on for 3 months.


I think the maker made me a weeding machine. I can stay bent over all day long. Short legs, long waist. My hands HATE weeding, though they were built for it, big strong and dumb. They get grass stains that don't come out. Fingers and fingertips crack and split, making guitar playing painful, as well a slow, because of joint swelling. But good garlic demands there be no competition from weeds.

And people wonder why my garlic don't come cheap? YOU stay bent over for 6 hrs a day for three days once a month for three months...it'll change your perspective as to what to charge for garlic!

The Farmer/WEEDER is the man who really feeds you...farmers and gardeners who don't weed, do grow much.  AGRI BIZ Corporations don't weed... they spray. Pick your poison. Pay or die.

Now ain't that pretty...wish mine looked that good right now, weed wise!