Roundup and tilling Garden

[turnkey4099]

we fought grass and weed seeds from the composted horse manure i use on my garden last year. There was a large area we didnt plant in the spring and i had tilled 2 or 3 times. Still the stuff cam back in a nice green carpet of weeds/grass

i got the roundup out on it and the area stayed dead all summer even after a till the area was much less weedie than the surrounding garden area that didnt get sprayed and the broccoli did great in the middle of it all.

The advantage of RU is that it kills the roots of the plants thus things that propagate from roots do not come back...well, mostly. Thus after a year or two of RU you are only fighting the weeds that come up from seeds.

There are weeds that propagate from both sources though and those can be a royal b*&* to get rid of. I bought this 2 acres in 1976. Canadian Thistle was so thick in places you couldn't walk through them. Also had a good crop of Morning Glory. I have the place almost totally clean of both now but still have a few show every year. Morning Glory is especially hard to clean out as their seeds remain viable for over 20 years in the soil.

Harry K

 

[BB_TX]

I bought Groundworks brand glyphosate in 25% concentration from Tractor Supply. They also had Roundup for about 30% higher price and only 18% concentration.
The Groundworks says for annuals and general weed control to mix at 2.25 oz per gal water and spray over 300 sq ft.
For perrenials and tough weed control, mix at 4.5 oz per gallon for the same coverage.

 

[teg]

Bill, is that really 300 sq.ft? That works out to about 2.5 gals of glyphosate / acre. I'm sure that should be 3000 sq.ft which is a quart to the acre which is within reason.




.

 

[kthompson]

wawajake, it is hard to believe your chemicals did not come with instructions on them but had some get torn off even by potential customers to read them.

On the about 40% ratio believe it is about a pint to about two pint per acre for crop land. That is mixed at from about 10 to 20 gallons per acre. I normally use 20 gallons per acre and it works fine also normally use about 1 1/2 pints. Now that is over what they call Roundup Ready Corn or Soybeans.

Depending on your set up, you may find tilling your ground and then waiting for the weeds to spout and spraying works better for you. Some farmers will do that here. Not sure the reason but could be time issue. Regardless of your method, if you bed up your rows using tractor, if you will do so and let the weeds sprout and then spray your round up if you wish to, but wait a few days for it to work and right before you plant run your bedding set up back down the rows to bust open the row and rebed it and you will find a good soft bed with no growing weeds. Sure was an improvement for me. BTW, the black ink pages of news paper works good for weed control in garden and can alos be plowed in.

 

[BB_TX]

Bill, is that really 300 sq.ft? That works out to about 2.5 gals of glyphosate / acre. I'm sure that should be 3000 sq.ft which is a quart to the acre which is within reason.
.

Those are the numbers given in a table "For use in gardens using tank sprayer". And it is 300 sq ft.
.
There is another table "Spray preparations for farmsteads using power spray equipment". The numbers in it vary from 1.8-3.6 quarts of glyphosate per acre for annual weeds to 5.5-9.5 quarts per acre for perennial weeds and woody brush.
.
This is defined as "where total control is desired".

 

[EastTexFrank]

Just curious as I have seen reports of other doing it and even companies adding 24d (or similar) to there glypsophate to get 'rapid kill'.

I don't see the logic. Roundup (and generics) kill by killing the roots and it takes time for the stuff to get down there. Getting rapid kill on the top growth seems counterproductive.

Harry K

I've never done it either but I believe that 2-4-D works by overstimulating the top growth in to growing faster than the roots can feed it and the broadleaf weed dies. So, by adding RoundUp and crippling the roots it would seem that they would be even less capable of feeding the top growth and death would be quicker. That's probably the logic behind it but to me it seems like trying to differentiate between dead and deader and unless you are under some sort of time constraint where you're desperate to save a few hours, it's a waste of money.

To the original poster, I use a 2% solution of RoundUp and, although it's not lightning fast, it works just fine but if you've got a tiller, run over it a couple of times and then spot spray the really tough boogers that come back up. It's much cheaper that way. Save the high dollar chemicals for where and when you really need them.

 

[MMagis]

Just curious as I have seen reports of other doing it and even companies adding 24d (or similar) to there glypsophate to get 'rapid kill'.

I don't see the logic. Roundup (and generics) kill by killing the roots and it takes time for the stuff to get down there. Getting rapid kill on the top growth seems counterproductive.

Harry K

My reasoning for adding 2,4,D to Gly is that it's much more effective on broadleaf weeds than gly is, at least for me. Gly kills some broadleafs fine, but others are uneffected. It really doesn't have anything to do with killing faster, just a more complete kill.

 

[WarrenF]

Just curious as I have seen reports of other doing it and even companies adding 24d (or similar) to there glypsophate to get 'rapid kill'.

I don't see the logic. Roundup (and generics) kill by killing the roots and it takes time for the stuff to get down there. Getting rapid kill on the top growth seems counterproductive.

Harry K

Using 2-4D mixed with Roundup will give you a better kill rate. If you are trying to kill a noxious weed, like morning glory, you will notice that the combination kills better than not using the combination.

I live in big row crop country.....and farmers have been using that combination for years.

 

[Chuck52]

If clover was the only problem, I'd just till. However, my land was and still partly is fescue hay field. Whenever I've converted any of that to garden area I've first killed it with RoundUp and then tilled repeatedly. Sometimes, if what came up looked like more fescue, I'd hit it with more RoundUp. Fescue must spread by the tiniest of root fragments. If I just till the stuff under in a couple months you wouldn't know I'd done anything but aerate it.

Chuck

 

[nmu98]

Just curious as I have seen reports of other doing it and even companies adding 24d (or similar) to there glypsophate to get 'rapid kill'.

I don't see the logic. Roundup (and generics) kill by killing the roots and it takes time for the stuff to get down there. Getting rapid kill on the top growth seems counterproductive.

Harry K

2-4-d will also stay on the top of the soil and work for a little time after spraying. All weather dependant. Roundup will do nothing after it is sprayed.

Many people will spray both and not till because you get the benifit of killing everything, and also killing any new growth for a little time after.