Good Ole Weeds.........Huh?

I have been readig some more on the site below. It just goes against the grain of conventional thinking. I still believe it is very important to keep weeds out of rows of vegetable plants especially while they are small.
I remember the time I was up at my daughter's house in NW Indiana. I had set out some watermelons in a small patch. About the first of August or so I was up there and was horrified to see the huge pig weeds that had suddenly infested the planting. Dummy me, I rushed in there trying to pull them up and was breaking melons off in the process. Strangely enough there was a 40 pound Tendergold and a 25 pound one also on a plant that had those pig weeds right there with the melon where it came out of the ground!

After reading the weed site post, I am planning to plant a couple pigweed or amaranth between some of the watermelons!

http://journeytoforever.org/farm_library/weeds/WeedsToC.html#contents

First thing you need to do is a soil test. Evidently you're soil is lacking something if the weeds are the reason you are getting big melons. It doesn't usually work that way. n nWith good soil you don't need weeds, I read the comments on that site. Weeds provide trace minerals? Huh? Which ones would those be? Better to layer with cardboard or wet newspapers and mulch the dickens out of your melon patch. Plant in well cultivated composted soil and the melons will go like crazy. Amaranth is a good cover crop, unfortunately, I can't use it as I'm allergic to it.

doc,
I am trying to make good soil conditions even better.....or is it possible to have too good of soil.

Never! Check out the soil and composting thread for tips on setting up a compost pile, or you can do lasanga gardening, aerobic teas to help improve your soil. It won't happen all at once, but if you keep working it one day you'll have black loam to grow in :) Are you new to DG? If so welcome! This is a wonderful site, the people are great and more than willing to share information on how to improve your garden not to mention seeds for everything under the sun!

doc,

Thanks for the quick and helpful info.. Uh, No I am not new....

No problem, be glad to help any way I can :)

doccat5, thought you said you were new?? :) I didn't know that amarath is a good cover crop.. That's good to know.. Do you happen to know which amarath cultivar? Cuz I know there's amarath cultivar that's edible too..

Only new to seed trading, I've been gardening organically for about 25+. I usually do about an 1800 sq ft area for veggies and flowers, but we're going to start tearing out lawn and planting mainly flowers in some of the areas. I already have 3 new beds laid out. And am planning a little one for some horseradish and rubbarb. I'd have to google for the amarath. I have a couple of friends who are Sioux indians that grow it by the field.

Interesting.. I wanted to go organic.. I haven't really started yet since I'm pretty new and all my attempts so far haven't fared too well.. You have any advice on organic indoor gardenin?? I'm having horrible problems with spider mites and white flies (the little tiny flies in the potting soil)..

As Arte Johnson said, "Veddy in ter est ing". We want to plant alongside a swing arbor in a bermuda grass lawn and have been pzzling how to control the grass. This post gives me an idea.

Don't.

I'm thinking clear a narrow bed between the arbor posts, keep it grass free until the plants are well established, then it's every plant for itself.

Use cardboard over the bermuda grass, it will smother it out. It may take some time, but I favor that method over a lot of others. I have quack grass which another pain in the tushie.

For houseplants, I use insecticidal soap on the spider mites, you can also dunk plants in tepid water in the bathtub. Most of these little critters don't swim well. Good dunk and let the plants drain well. Then check again in the next couple days.

I used an insecticadal soap and that burnt all the leaves. And I had to use it twice (basically burnt the leaves that I missed before) before the plants were better. Think I will try the bathtub method next time.. Good thing that my banana has recovered from prior attempts.. Don't think that would fit in the bathtub.. :) What about the white flies?? They can just take off when I soak them.. Any advice there??

Were you using a commercial insecticidal soap or homemade? Try this site for white fly measures http://www.diatect.com/p-garden-and-floral-get-rid-of-white-flies.php?gclid=CO_OweHG25ACFRuhFQodBTLrXA

I don't like weeds in my gardens perid. although i'm on a larger scale weeds make it harder to grow. IMHO.
Rich

Doccat5, I was using commercial insecticidal soap. I don't know how to make homemade one and even if I did, I'm worried it won't work.. The website you gave looks interesting. Do you happen to know if it's safe to use around pregnant people like myself?? I'm usually not that worried about stuff but I'm pregnant right now and DH is always worried about me using chemicals..

Non toxic to humans. Hmm, sounds like the plants are super sensitive to the soap. It's a good idea to test a small area first. Homemade is just water and a tiny, tiny bit of dishsoap. I use Dawn.

Well, I read the whole link above in the first post. . I found it delightfully informative. It gives me a different slant on those pesky weeds. Sure, we don't like them, but they probably have been far more needful than we like to admit.

Very interesting article. IMHO I think the article is referring to native plains plants when he refers to "weeds". Those plants put down roots that are VERY deep, and are responsible for creating the wonderful soil that is America's Breadbasket. By having roots that go down 6' and more, they are able to "bring up" those minerals - where the plants we have introduced have such shallow root systems in comparison that they can't begin to do the same things.

I've always heard where theres luxirant growth of weeds the soil is fertile.

Well, Dean, if it isn't fertile yet, it is working on it!!