Herbicides--what poison-free alternatives can control unwanted vegetation

I hope people will post their tips for controlling unwanted vegetation, including both prophylactic measures and controlling established unwanted vegetation.

 

Unwanted things sprouting in the midst of your rocks? My neighbor fills a spray bottle with vinegar and squirts the leaves as soon as they emerge and it works well. I generally just use my handy little weed-lifter tool--looks like a long screwdriver with a notch cut out, but it does involve stooping and crouching and that isn't too easy for some of us, so my other
neighbor has solved this with a long handled tool he said road crews use but I haven't found a store that sells it. It is like a letter D with teeth on the flat side, so it works sort of like a hoe and works beautifully for the edges where his stones meet the sidewalk.

 

Regular old Bleach will also kill most weeds & their roots... I have used this for years....Weeds in your sidewalk cracks - - or how about an ant hill in your side walk/ patio/ drive cracks -- use straight bleach poured on to it - - works like magic. Not certain if Suncityjack considers bleach an alternative -- but to me it would be.

 

I have tried vinegar. Not much luck.

Now I will try straight bleach.

I am tired of going out early morning to pull the grass that comes up in my courtyard after grass has been reseeded.

 

Surprised the vinegar didn't do it, but guess it always depends on the type of weed we're dealing with, its age, etc. Try boiling water. Nothing cleaner than it, but of course not good if near living plants you also don't want to destroy, but great for inbetween rocks. Anita Mae, your sixth sense was right, I would not recommend bleach, either out of the house or in. There are much safer alternatives. Many of us were raised with bleach as a go-to product, but research shows we are probably hurting rather than helping. Here's only one article of many you can find re: this: http://www.sustainablebabysteps.com/what-is-bleach.html

 

The latest AARP Bulletin on page 22 suggests making a spray of "1 gallon of white distilled vinegar mixed with 1 ounce of liquid dish soap."
It also suggested to "Save money on weed killers by spreading several layers of newspapers on the soil before mulching....This blocks weeds from growing and it helps retain moisture, so you save even more by needing to water plants less."

 

I like that idea of mixing vinegar with the liquid soap...I would think that would work !! The newspaper idea sounds good also !
Thanks for sharing your findings, scjack!

 

I am not trying to get rid of weeds.
It is grass and happens when the lawn outside my courtyard is reseeded.
Very deep ugly roots. I pull what I can and spray the rest.

 

While not maybe what one would think of when thinking of a "weed," the grass is where you don't want it, so it is a weed to you in the sense that it is a plant that is out of place, not intentionally sown in that location, and you need to control it and the principles would be the same. Similarly, I used to have a yard with a portion of it dedicated to "weeds" like milkweeds, but I wanted them there so encouraged them. This choice made many a monarch butterfly quite happy.