Creeping couch grass: how to get rid of a malicious weed on the site. How to remove wheatgrass from the garden, suburban area forever? How to get rid of couch grass with chemistry, herbicides, green manure, folk remedies? Weeds in the wheatgrass garden

Creeping couch grass is a perennial rhizomatous plant of the Bluegrass family (cereals) is one of the most difficult to eradicate and harmful weeds. Underground shoots of it (the awl) penetrate through potato tubers, making them unmarketable. The root system of wheatgrass releases toxic substances that inhibit growth cultivated plants. In addition, the thickets of this weed serve as a shelter (reservoir) for many pests (wireworms, scoops, beetle larvae) and diseases (rust, ergot, root rot, viruses). In connection with this fight against couch grass, give Special attention.

The main mass of couch grass rhizomes is formed in the upper (15 cm) soil layer. Their length reaches 1000 km per hectare, on these rhizomes up to 40 million renewal buds. Buds germinate throughout the growing season. Crushing the rhizomes into small parts increases the number of buds by 80-90%, since a small segment of the rhizome 1.5-2 cm long, having only one bud, can germinate and form a new plant. But when the segments are embedded in the soil to a depth of 30 cm, all the wheatgrass buds die. Therefore, direct the methods of dealing with creeping wheatgrass to destroy the rhizomes of the weed, do not let it catch on. Do not use poorly rotted manure, do not bring in soil from "dusty" areas, do not allow it to spread from neighboring areas, weed out its sprouts every 10-12 days.

Destroy the rhizomes of the wheatgrass can be such agrotechnical methods as exhaustion, drying, suffocation. Depletion: immediately after harvesting the cultivated crops, disk the soil in two directions (longitudinal and transverse), respectively, to a depth of 8-12 and 12-15 cm. or plow the soil (27-30 cm). Drying: Remove the rhizomes from the soil with a rake or harrow, leave them on the surface for 25-30 days, then plant them to a depth of 27-30 cm, from where they cannot germinate. Suffocation: in places of focal distribution of couch grass (at the beginning of the spring growth of the weed), cover the area with old plastic wrap or cardboard, pour a layer of soil 5-7 cm thick on top to completely shade the plants. Deprived of light and moisture, creeping wheatgrass dies in 30-40 days.

To control wheatgrass and other weeds, 3-4 weeks before sowing or planting crops, use preparations based on glyphosate - raumdap, hurricane, etc. at a rate of 30-50 ml, diluted in 5 liters of water per 100 m 2 (prepare the solution for pure unsalted water). When spraying, completely exclude the ingress of herbicides on the leafy mass of cultivated plants. The height of wheatgrass at the time of processing should not be more than 15-20 cm.

The anticereal herbicides fyuziladsuper, nabu, targa-super, etc. (40-50 ml, diluted in 5 l of water for spraying 100 m 2) are highly effective in the fight against creeping couch grass. Apply them to vegetables. gourds ah, potatoes, sugar and fodder beets, sunflowers, tobacco, in gardens and vineyards - on all cultures of the dicotyledonous class. Do not use these herbicides on cereals, cereals and corn. Plan to spray with herbicides in the spring on growing crops (regardless of their development phase) during the period when the wheatgrass height does not exceed 20 cm. The preparations quickly penetrate the leaves and root system of the weed and completely dry out its rhizomes in 2-3 weeks. During this time, do not loosen the soil, so as not to reduce the efficiency of processing.

The herbicides recommended for the control of couch grass do not pose a risk to humans, animals and environment, they quickly disintegrate after application. When working with them, strictly follow the safety regulations.

One of the most common and difficult to remove in the garden is wheatgrass. Many gardeners have been fighting him for years and no longer know how to get wheatgrass out of the garden. In this article, we will consider various ways how to deal with wheatgrass.

What does creeping wheatgrass weed look like?

Couch grass creeping is a perennial herbaceous plant family of cereals, can reach a height of 50 to 120 cm, having a very long creeping and knotty rhizome that penetrates the soil to a depth of 1 m. It can be recognized by its erect, smooth, hairless, with small flat leaves of green or bluish-green color a stem, at the end of which there is an ear containing up to ten thousand seeds that remain viable for 12 years. Its flowering begins in early - mid-summer, after which the fruits ripen. Propagated by seeds and rhizome, shoots can even give pieces of root 5 cm long, so the problem of how to get rid of wheatgrass is always relevant. It loves moisture very much and grows well during the rainy season, and during the drought period it gives weak vegetation or completely dies out.

Ways to deal with wheatgrass in the garden

These methods refer to agrotechnical measures of extermination.

1. When digging the soil, it is good to choose the roots, not leaving even small pieces; for greater efficiency, it is necessary to clear the earth in parts. To protect already cleaned areas, the edges of the wheatgrass garden can be sprinkled with vinegar.
2. After cleaning the soil, to reduce the viability of the rhizomes remaining in the ground, corn, zucchini, alfalfa, oats, winter rye, vetch with oats, peas with oats, buckwheat should be planted, increasing the sowing rate by 10-15%. The roots of oats perfectly kill the roots of the weed, so you can dig up the ground with unselected wheatgrass for half a shovel and, making a groove across, plant oats. Everyone knows the same way, planting several bushes of dahlias at random and part of the site to be cleared without your intervention.
3. Use cardboard: without digging, in the spring we cover part of the area with wheatgrass, pour a small layer of earth on top and sow plants with a small root system there, for example, greens. Due to the lack of light, the roots of the wheatgrass themselves will rot in the ground.
4. Cut the green mass of the weed with a Fokin flat cutter or any other weeder at a depth of no more than 2 cm, without damaging the rhizomes. This should be done every 5-6 days, then the roots do not receive nutrition and die off.
5. Use soil compaction (do not dig it up), in this case there is not enough air for the roots and the wheatgrass disappears on its own.

Herbicides against couch grass

In the fight against this weed, you should still first apply all of the listed methods on how to get rid of wheatgrass, and only if they do not help prevent it from appearing in your garden, then you can start using herbicides continuous action. Glyphosate-containing preparations have the best effect on couch grass: Glyphosate, Glyphos, Roundup, Glisol, Hurricane Forte, Tornado, etc. The most favorable period for effective application herbicides is the time from the beginning of tillering to the heading of the weed, when it has intensive growth. But, according to scientists, such drugs should be used no more than once every 3 years.

It has always been difficult for couch grass to creeping gardeners to fight, because this plant is endowed with a surprisingly tenacious root system - even a small root, falling into the ground, takes root and begins to grow in all directions, clogging the plantings of cultivated plants with its roots.

How to get rid of wheatgrass in the garden is one of the pressing issues of those who have this kind of weed in their plots and are not amenable to methods of mechanical destruction.

Getting rid of wheatgrass with chemicals

The chemical industry has released a range of products that can be applied to areas before other crops have yet been planted:

• Hurricane Forte;
• Glyphos;
• Roundup;
• Tornado;
• Glyphosate, others.

A couple of weeks after treatment with wheatgrass preparations, the weed begins to die, the components of the preparations, thanks to chemical reactions, decay, and cease to be dangerous to other plants. You can start sowing seeds or planting seedlings.

It is also effective to apply herbicides after the crop is harvested, and weather allow new shoots of the weed to germinate. After reaching a height of 20 cm, wheatgrass should be treated with one of the listed drugs.

There are herbicides that can be used on growing plantings of grapes: Fusilad Super, Naboo. They act selectively, helping to remove wheatgrass from the garden without damaging or destroying the main crops.

It should be remembered that manufacturers warn about the norms for the use of funds - no more than 1 time in 3 years, be sure to follow the instructions in the instructions. The approximate result after their use is about 75-80% destruction.

The use of agrotechnical means to combat wheatgrass in the garden

Often, gardeners are looking for ways to do without herbicides. Multiple ways to get rid of wheatgrass grass in the garden are aimed at weakening its growth and reproduction intensity.

For example, couch grass does not tolerate shading: if the area where it grows freely is covered with a dense black film, a layer of earth, peat, straw is poured on top so that its sprouts are further oppressed, by autumn this plot can be cleared of weeds.

Some plants help to get rid of wheatgrass, next to which it simply cannot grow.

After plowing a plot with wheatgrass and sowing it:

• corn;
• sunflower;

Sowing oats on a plot will help not only destroy wheatgrass in the garden, but also significantly fertilize the soil that it depletes:

The benefit of this method is also that it helps to populate areas with wheatgrass. You can try to sow oats with vetch or peas, which gives very good results.

Another interesting method is used, which allows you to immediately use the plot, on which creeping couch grass is displayed, for planting. Also, the method is very simple:

1. Cardboard is spread over the grown weed, various decomposable plant debris is poured on top - dry foliage, small branches from bushes and trees, etc.
2. A layer of fertile soil is poured, mixed with turf, leveled.
3. Along the edges of the plot, if desired, bricks, slate, boards are installed. It turns out a semblance of a bed or flower bed, on which you can plant seedlings of flowers or vegetables. Wheatgrass under such a bed will disappear forever.

Preventive weed control

Prevention of the growth of wheatgrass is the main rule that helps to prevent clogging of the site with this weed.

The wheatgrass sprouts that have appeared are immediately removed, carefully clearing the ground of all the roots found in it. Even a small process, the size of a centimeter, if it has a kidney, is able to germinate.

Carefully use the application of not quite rotted manure to the beds, which probably contains seeds and trimmings of wheatgrass roots.

Couch grass roots and spikelets with seeds must not be placed in compost heap. They retain their vitality, even if they have dried out, and then got into an environment comfortable for their germination.

Getting rid of the wheat grass garden is, of course, troublesome, but it is possible to defeat it. Often mowing, shading, oppressing, falling asleep with plant debris, gardeners will gradually be able to clear their plots of annoying malicious weed.

Mulch as a way to deal with couch grass creeping

The gardener talks about mulch - one of the ways to deal with creeping wheatgrass without the use of chemicals:

The scourge of all summer residents is a weed called Wheatgrass. It is difficult to get rid of it, especially when there is a lot of it, but not so much as to do nothing at all. Creeping couch grass is very resilient, it is weeded out, and it begins to grow again. After rain, it instantly grows to the waist, clogs all crops and damages root crops. One small thin root that has fallen into your garden is able to fill the entire space.

You can get wheatgrass out of the garden different ways, sparing the soil or herbicide Roundup, Tornado or Glyphosate. Once on the leaves and shoots, the drug descends into the roots and destroys the plant. Chemical method fast, efficient and does not take much effort, but do not forget that then you have to grow vegetables in the beds. Therefore, in order to remove the wheatgrass weed, we still recommend using folk methods.

1. If there are several bushes in the garden, then you can quickly get rid of it by picking out the roots. To do this, carefully pull out the bush and all its smallest particles with a pitchfork, remove it from the site. You can’t use a shovel, because if you cut at least a small piece of the root, the wheatgrass will grow again. In this place, plant dahlias, alfalfa, buckwheat or squash, increasing the seeding rate. Thus, thickened root system plants will displace the remnants of the roots.

2. A dark-colored film helps very effectively in the fight against wheatgrass. It is covered with a weed-inhabited area for the whole season, the edges are fixed with stones, and peat or straw is applied on top. Thus, the wheatgrass does not get access to light and its growth stops. This method is also effective for killing another evil weed! It is better to use a double film so that precipitation or a dog / cat cannot immediately damage the material. Such a film is more expensive than a single one, but there is more confidence in it. Do not use covering materials (spunbond, lutrasil) in the fight against wheatgrass, they can let in air and partially light, and this is strictly prohibited for wheatgrass. AT modern world the environmental friendliness of cardboard is questionable, it is possible that some chemical impurities are added during its manufacture.

3. An exhausting way to get rid of the wheatgrass in the garden will be cutting the roots. In the spring, cut the roots with pruning shears a little deeper into the soil. You will have to do the procedure far more than once, but each time the plants will weaken more and more, until at one fine moment growth stops.

4. You can get rid of wheatgrass with the help of. They have a beneficial effect on the soil and at the same time kill the wheatgrass. First you need to dig up the site and then sow rye, beans, corn. Quickly cope with the weed oats and enrich the soil with nitrogen. After digging, make grooves at a distance of 15 cm from each other. Sow oats. Before the seeds ripen, mow by turning the soil layers down and sow again. During the season, you can have time to make 3 crops.

5. Make an artificial flowerbed on the wheatgrass. To do this, lay a dark film or cardboard on the wheatgrass (just carefully examine it so that there are no holes on it), put a layer of branches and leaves on top. Cover with soil and plant flowers or greens (dill, parsley), outline the boundaries with boulders and stones. As a result, wheatgrass is hatched, and the flower bed pleases!

The area in which the couch grass was removed is sprayed with vinegar (6%) twice: in spring and autumn after harvest. Vinegar will quickly corrode the remnants of the roots, while decomposing into carbon dioxide and the water will not harm other crops.

Which of them is the most effective is difficult to say, each of them has a place to be. Try, experiment and remember that any impact on wheatgrass will definitely reduce or stop its growth. If there is a lot of wheatgrass, then divide the garden into sections, insert pegs with the name of the method of struggle and try each of the following. The results can then be reported in the comments.

Creeping wheatgrass is one of the most malicious weeds that inhabit our gardens and orchards. It is not easy to fight it, because its root system is very powerful and long. It not only drowns out the plants planted in the beds, deprives them of light and moisture, but also releases special substances that prevent the growth of many crops.

Conventional control methods applied to other weeds often lead to even more growth of wheatgrass. It is so tenacious that any, even the smallest pruning of the root, is able to give life to a new specimen. You can, of course, dig up the garden with a pitchfork every year in spring and autumn, carefully choosing all the roots that come across. But it is much easier to use methods of struggle that take into account biological features this plant.

Strangulation method

The area infected with couch grass is carefully plowed using disc tools. At the same time, they try to chop the rhizomes as much as possible and bury them deeper - 30 cm from the surface. At such a depth, renewal buds are no longer able to germinate.

Another variant of this method of dealing with wheatgrass is that various plant residues are laid out on the area requiring cleaning - the more the better. Rougher stems and tops are placed in the lower layer, and softer and juicier ones are placed in the upper layer. The whole structure is densely sprinkled wood ash and on top of the earth, the layer of which should be at least 10 cm. Next spring, it is quite possible to plant zucchini or pumpkins on such a “pie”. And in a year, there will be no trace of wheatgrass in this place.

Instead of plant residues, a fairly dense mulch material can be used. Suitable for this purpose, for example, cardboard. It is not necessary to dig the site at all. It is enough just to cover it with a layer of cardboard and pour over the ground into which to sow green manure.

For a two-year period, the method using black polyethylene film or ruberoid. You can speed up the process somewhat if you first cut the roots with a flat cutter and water the bed with a solution of a biological product containing bacteria that feed on plant debris. For example, if Baikal EM1 is used in the spring, then it will be possible to remove the film as early as May of the next year.

Planting plants that suppress wheatgrass

There are plants that fight weeds quite effectively, for example, dahlias. If you plant them often enough, then the site will gradually be cleared of wheatgrass without much effort.

Able to rid beds of couch grass and common rye. The site is first dug up and fenced off so that the rhizomes of the weed cannot penetrate it from the side. Rye is sown quite densely - much denser than all the recommended norms. As soon as it turns green, they mow and plow, leaving it to “rest” for about a month. Then the rye is sown again, doing all the operations two more times. next spring there will no longer be couch grass in this place, and the earth will become loose and fertile.

Often, on those ridges where there was too much couch grass, it is recommended to plant potatoes first. Of course, he himself does not affect the weed in any way. But constant loosening and hilling produces the most unfavorable effect on wheatgrass, which is why development slows down and the seeds do not ripen.

Regular mowing

If couch grass is wound up on the lawn, then frequent and very short mowing or cutting can help. If you do not let it grow above 5 cm, then gradually the roots are depleted, and the weed will disappear.

Chemical weeding

To combat couch grass, you can use various herbicides that act selectively or destroy all types of plants.

The most common non-selective herbicides are substances based on glyphosate. They affect the metabolic processes in plants. Most of them act only on the aerial parts of the weeds, without affecting the roots. They should be used very carefully - only before the emergence of shoots of the main crop or after its harvest. For more full action it is desirable to spray wheatgrass during its most active growth, when the plants already have at least three leaves.

On plantings of gourds, sugar beets, potatoes and grapes, special anticereal herbicides such as Fusilade Super, Targa Super, Nabu, etc. can be used. Spraying is permissible directly on growing plantings at a time when the height of wheat grass leaves is not exceeds 20 cm.

Precautionary measures against wheatgrass

The basic rule to follow in the fight against couch grass is not to allow it to spread freely. Unfortunately, conventional mulching will not help here, since couch grass shoots can pierce even a meter layer of clean sand.

Rhizomes selected during weeding should not be placed in the general compost heap. Their vitality is so great that, even when dried, they are able to sprout when they enter a humid environment with a suitable temperature.

In order not to bring seeds and rhizomes of couch grass to the site, soil should not be brought from zapyreenny places. Very carefully it is necessary to use insufficiently rotted manure - the presence in it of both seeds and cuttings of roots with renewal buds is very likely.

If, nevertheless, this weed got into the beds, then it is necessary to weed out its sprouts as early as possible, at intervals of no more than 10 days.