Some of my rose beds are being overrun by weeds. Battling these weeds feels like a full-time job right now. It's warm and sunny most of the time, and we have had ample rain ... creating conditions where the weeds can thrive. I'm not sure I've ever seen so many types of weeds before.
I spent 5 minutes outside with my camera, waiting for the schoolbus this afternoon, and I found:
Crab Grass,
Bermuda Grass,
Poke Weed,
Ground Ivy,
Creeping Woodsorrel,
Dandelion,
White Clover,
Morning Glory,
Purple Deadnettle,
some weed I haven't identified yet, and lots more.
I won't even begin to list the weeds that grow in the Rose Field. It's been too hot here for the past week to get out and do any consistent work outside. Add to this, we've had really good rain for the past few weeks, and we have a formula for explosive weed growth.
Here is one of my secret weapons:
Ornamec is a selective herbicide that only kills grassy weeds, and it doesn't harm broadleaf plants (like roses). I can use it in my rose beds to kill Bermuda and Crab Grass, which are so incredibly hard to get rid of any other way. (The same chemical is available ready to use as Ortho's Grass-B-Gone.)
If you want to give Ornamec a try, be sure to read the label to make sure that it is safe around the plants near your grassy weeds. Roses are one of the plants specifically mentioned in the instructions as safe.
For broadleaf weeds in large areas (away from the roses!) I use glyphosate (expensive brand name: Round-up).
Glyphosate is a non-selective herbicide, which means that it kills any green plant it touches, so extreme caution must be used when applying it. I never spray glyphosate if there is any breeze, because I won't risk having it drift onto my roses. As you can see, I bought the super economy size bottle of concentrate this last time. I have garden areas to clear, and Glyphosate is the best way for me to kill off vegetation in an area that I'm preparing for roses. (My gardens are WAY too big to even consider digging the grass and weeds out by hand.)
Some of the newly planted roses are barely able to keep their little heads above the faster-growing weeds that are trying to suffocate them. I have to carefully pull all of these weeds by hand. Moist soil the day after it rains makes really nice conditions for pulling weeds. Even the wild onions come out without a fight.
I have found that the areas with the worst weeds are the beds where the mulch has deteriorated almost to the point of having bare ground showing. After I get rid of these current weeds, I MUST make it a priority to put down more mulch to try to keep this from happening again.
