What weedkiller do folks recommend?

We tried some cheap "Doff" stuff (should that be Duff) but it hasn't done a thing. Their slug pellets work a treat but the weedkiller is bla! I had much better success using some old Sodium Chlorate that was in the garage and by the next the sprayed weeds were dead. Problem is Sodium Chlorate is banned which is a pity as it was a cheap option.

Bayer is on sale at our local Wilkinson, but wanted to get some opinions before wasting any money. With our poo summers most companies recommend spraying the weeds when rain is not in the forecast.

I have my own lawncare business and the stuff you get from garden centres is mostly rubbish. I'm, not touting for Business as you are far away from me but i'd recommed getting the professionals in as the stuff they use is only available commercially (you need to be qualified to use it). I use 3 different kinds depending on the type of weeds - the easiest to kill are the likes of dandelions i.e. single roots. The most difficult are those that spread under the ground, generally they will require 2/3 applications.
Don't put any liquid down if it is going to rain within 4 hours as it will get washed away.
If you let me know how big your lawn is I'll give you an idea as to how much it should cost

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Hi

Yes I was talking to a local council landscaper and he said pretty much the same thing. Is there anywhere online some of the better stuff can be purchased from?

On another note, why was Sodium Chlorate banned by the EU? When I used it the other day, it killed the treated weeds in hours and by the next days I pulled up the weeds and all the roots were damaged/dead too. I can remember my old man  using it years ago on his allotment and it always worked a treat and was much cheaper than branded weedkiller. Seems most available weekillers are Glyphosate based now-a-days.

 

Hi

Yes I was talking to a local council landscaper and he said pretty much the same thing. Is there anywhere online some of the better stuff can be purchased from?

On another note, why was Sodium Chlorate banned by the EU? When I used it the other day, it killed the treated weeds in hours and by the next days I pulled up the weeds and all the roots were damaged/dead too. I can remember my old man  using it years ago on his allotment and it always worked a treat and was much cheaper than branded weedkiller. Seems most available weekillers are Glyphosate based now-a-days.

Sodium Chlorate was banned as it is highly toxic to both humans and animals. The stuff you get nowadays is as you say mostly glyphosphate based and not as detrimental to the envirmonment - though you do need to keep it way from ponds.

A website you could try is www.amenity.co.uk, I buy all my products from them. The best general purpose weedkiller (at a reasonable price) is Re-Act 

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I had a very large Cordyline that was destroyed in the winter cold and I cut it right down to a low fork in the trunk hoping it might sprout again.  It didn't, so today I decided to cut the remaining trunk down but found 7 baby Cordylines sprouting from the ground around it!!   

I was convinced my Callistemon had gone for good but hadn't got round to digging it out. When I did find time, I noticed some little weeds around its base. Only they weren't weeds, they were ickle callistemon shoots from the rootball. I've hacked the deadwood right back and it's coming along nicely now.

I lost two eucalyptus trees last winter, too. Same story - now vigorous growth from the base. Still have to lumberjack the 30'+ dead trees though

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I have had a hugh crop of Blueberries, Boysenberries, Blackcurants and Jostabrries. and Raspberries, Strawberries, Pine berries were not  as good this year.. Blackberries are starting to ripen a month ahead of time

I've grown potatoes, carrots, spring onions, broccoli, sprouts & peas in containers around my patio.

Mixed results....

Had my first dig of the potatoes yesterday. Absolutely delicious. First time I'd grown them since being a kid and they tasted fantastic. Only used about a quarter of the crop, too.

Carrots also yummy. I don't tend to eat carrots cos I don't like them - but these, dug straight from the 'ground', are sweet and fresh.

The spring onions are much bigger than last year - probably due to less crowded planting.

The sprouts look to be coming along well, strong stalks & healthy leafage.

Most of the broccoli plants have bolted, after I couldn't stop the roots getting too hot. Shan't be growing brocolli again

My peas have also been a bit of a failure. I bought about half a dozen small plants and only 2 have in any way thrived, and even then not to the extent I'd envisaged. 3 plants have now withered and another looks decidedly poorly. There haven't been enough pods ready at the same time to give enough peas for an accompaniment.

 

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I have had a hugh crop of Blueberries, Boysenberries, Blackcurants and Jostabrries. and Raspberries, Strawberries, Pine berries were not  as good this year.. Blackberries are starting to ripen a month ahead of time

Our blackberry crop is in its final stages already, and we have had tons of them, right from early July. I don't know what variety we have in our garden, but they're very vigorous, very early, very big and very juicy! It's a constant battle to keep them under control as they want to take over the whole garden, but we get more fruit than we know what to do with...

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We've decided, that as reliable as they are, this year will be our last for petunias. Masses of flowers in the hanging baskets, but masses of flowers = masses of dead heading to keep them looking their best; additionally they're so vigorous that they swamp everything else that's planted in the baskets  Next year we'll be going back to fushias and begonias, also last year we had some double nasturtiums in baskets at the front of the house which were a great success.

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Cleared the garden 2 months early this year as I removed the rotten plants and the wild sweet peas that was growing onto the patio edge had kept it the patio parts damp all the time from the recent wash out days, is now all cleared away and dug up well to allow to dry out properly as it haven't been dry since May.  Only 3 plants left and one of them is vine plants which some are already ripen but very slowly due to lack of warm sunny weather around.  I normally clear the garden in mid October as we often get warm dry spells in the past but to be in the safe side after this poor summer I decided to do it early and finish for this year.  It also in the safe side in case we may get very wet and cool start to Autumn so it would be difficult to use the garden by then.  Latest record of clearing away was November 1995 after a very warm Oct allow the plants to florish longer.

Our greenhouse tomatoes are very dissapointing this year and we have spoken to other tomato growers, and they have the same problems.

We have only picked about a dozen ripe ones so far. The green ones on the plants look fewer and smaller than normal and a lot of the flowers havn`t developed into tomatoes at all, the flowers just shrivel up and drop off, leaving nothing.

Has anyone else had this problem?

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Our greenhouse tomatoes are very dissapointing this year and we have spoken to other tomato growers, and they have the same problems.

We have only picked about a dozen ripe ones so far. The green ones on the plants look fewer and smaller than normal and a lot of the flowers havn`t developed into tomatoes at all, the flowers just shrivel up and drop off, leaving nothing.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Our tomatoes have been disastrous this season had to destroy several plants and the remaining ones have produced only a handful of fruits

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Our greenhouse tomatoes are very dissapointing this year and we have spoken to other tomato growers, and they have the same problems.

We have only picked about a dozen ripe ones so far. The green ones on the plants look fewer and smaller than normal and a lot of the flowers havn`t developed into tomatoes at all, the flowers just shrivel up and drop off, leaving nothing.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Our tomatoes have been disastrous this season had to destroy several plants and the remaining ones have produced only a handful of fruits

Ours have plenty of fruits on them, but none are anywhere near ripe yet. Whether it will be warm and sunny enough for them to ripen, I don't know, otherwise it's green tomato chutney time!

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Our tomatoes a disaster too - but probably because I forgot to remove the axels.

Our spuds, spinach, lettuce, red onions were all pretty good.

The big success was the broad beans - had LOADS of them this year. I think this was because the warm spring meant that there were more bees and hence better pollenisation of the flowers.

Planted out the late croppers at the start of August (radishes, cabbages, turnips). But all have been very disappointing. Seems they have been nibbled a lot... didn't happen with earlier crops - anyone any idea? next year I'll just have to cloche the late croppers, I guess. Having said that, up here it's hard to get things to grow at this stage of the season.

Thoughts for next year? Need to prioritise expensive veg -

1) Lettuce is so cheap to grow yet so expensive to buy, so that's a definite.
2) Tomatoes - will try a different variety - the small ones that hang down from baskets
3) won't bother with spuds - they're so cheap in the supermarket anyway.
4) broad beans - yes
5) Onions - yes, but will try not to mow the shoots off and hence restrict their growth next time!
6) Spinach - possibly - but making the pesto is expensive given the cost of pine nuts and parmesan.
7) Might try sweet potato... broccoli was a disaster last time I tried and sprouts ended up looking like peas on a straw!

Anyone any suggestions for decent summer croppers? We have 2 veg patches that can take about 14 rows of produce 2 - 3 metres long between them

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How about Runner Beans for a decent summer crop?  Ours have done very well this year and we are still picking them. The secret is to give them plenty of water. We usually plant the `Enorma` variety which produce beans 12 to 15 inches long.

I don`t think we have ever had a poor crop, unlike Tomatoes!

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Our greenhouse tomatoes are very dissapointing this year and we have spoken to other tomato growers, and they have the same problems.

We have only picked about a dozen ripe ones so far. The green ones on the plants look fewer and smaller than normal and a lot of the flowers havn`t developed into tomatoes at all, the flowers just shrivel up and drop off, leaving nothing.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Our tomatoes have been disastrous this season had to destroy several plants and the remaining ones have produced only a handful of fruits

Same here. Not sure what yours are doing but mine have just been going brown and rotting whether on the plants or taken off to be placed in a sunny window. As this is my first ever attempt at a veggie patch i'm glad its not something I've been doing thats caused it

 

Carrots haven't  grown, cauli's and broccoli have failed. On the plus side, Had some good cucumbers and beetroot, peas, runners, Spring Onions and the Parsnips were huge. Well, you live and learn I suppose

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Our greenhouse tomatoes are very dissapointing this year and we have spoken to other tomato growers, and they have the same problems.

We have only picked about a dozen ripe ones so far. The green ones on the plants look fewer and smaller than normal and a lot of the flowers havn`t developed into tomatoes at all, the flowers just shrivel up and drop off, leaving nothing.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Our tomatoes have been disastrous this season had to destroy several plants and the remaining ones have produced only a handful of fruits

Same here. Not sure what yours are doing but mine have just been going brown and rotting whether on the plants or taken off to be placed in a sunny window. As this is my first ever attempt at a veggie patch i'm glad its not something I've been doing thats caused it

 

Carrots haven't  grown, cauli's and broccoli have failed. On the plus side, Had some good cucumbers and beetroot, peas, runners, Spring Onions and the Parsnips were huge. Well, you live and learn I suppose

Carrots are notoriously difficult - and if you're not careful can ruin the soil I seem to recall MOnty Don saying. Broccoli - I've yet to manage a crop; Cauliflowers - was thinking of trying this year. Seriously, try dwarf broad beans - never fail and - if you've got kids - great fun taking them out of the pods.

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Speaking to the locals, carrots are difficult to grow around here. I have the Broad beans you mention growing quite well right now (due to be picked soon), although the youngest (5 year old) might help pick, I doubt the grumpy teen, or her sister with have any ideas about helping. Had a crop of Potatoes, plenty of herbs, and some spinach, and a few lettuce before they bolted. Sweetcorn is still growing but I'm not keen on how the Brussels or two types of cabbage are looking. Peppers are slow and celery never really took off. A whole host of fruit is under way, but that'll take a year or more to reap rewards.

This year was really about learning the basics and it has been a very useful exercise.

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The biggest problem with carrots is carrotfly, if you can't protect your crop then you've had it.

Not wanting to disturb my garden to accomodate a veg patch, I've grown in containers on the patio for the past couple of years. Last year were carrots & spring onions. Both were easy to grow, but because the kids sowed the seeds and I never got round to thinning-out, they were limited in size.

This year, the carrots have been great (I thinnned them out). I don't usually eat carrots, but the sweetness of these is amazing. The spring onions have been bigger, too.

The potatoes have been the real stars, though. Grown in two big plastic tubs (bought for next to nowt last autumn when some bargain shop was selling-off its garden stuff), I'm now left with about two-thirds of one tub, after 4 meals for the lot of us. And the taste! Fantastic.

The sprouts look OK, too. Perhaps the plants are a little on the small side, but I did plant them a bit close together. Going to up the plant food now.

The peas were a disaster. Initially quite strong growth, they just seemed to hit a wall and stop growing. Out of 7 plants, I reckon I only got about 25-30 pods in all, most picked in late June, after which I expected another few crops, but they seemed to wither. Any clues, anyone?

The broccoli's also been a fail. Out of 8 plants, 6 have bolted and the other two don't look that strong. I learned that it's vital to keep the roots cool, or they go to flower/seed. Won't be trying those again.

Think next year I'll stick to root veg.

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