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Not every owner of a summer cottage manages to purchase ready-made sown areas. Especially if houses and dachas are built on virgin lands. In this case, the whole dacha is a meadow overgrown with weeds with perennial plants penetrating the ground, like ropes, with their powerful roots. Therefore, the question of how to develop a plot for a garden, remove weeds from overgrown areas arises not only for beginners, but also for experienced farmers.
In addition to grass, shrubs often grow in such areas, which will also have to be uprooted in order to plant cultivated plants in their place. After acquiring at such a dacha, it is practically impossible to plant anything, the overgrown area will have to be brought into a divine form. Therefore, it is important to know how and by what means to clear thickets of grass and shrubs in the country so that you can not only sow vegetables, but also make a beautiful lawn.
Mechanical and agrotechnical methods
How to put in order the acquired site, completely overgrown with perennial weeds and shrubs? Gardeners and gardeners are enterprising people, great lovers of experiments. It is they who own many ways of processing weed-grown areas and preparing them for planting cultivated plants. It should be noted that our grandmothers did not have the means of chemical production to help get rid of weeds. They used safe yet effective methods. But first of all, the site needs to be planned.
Cultivated plants for weed control
Is it possible, by putting in order the territory of the dacha, to use part of the overgrown area for planting cultivated plants already in the first year? Yes, you can, and planting will help you get rid of weeds.
- Part of the site can be dug up and planted potatoes or cabbage. Growing, they close the access of light to the weeds. In addition, such plants during the vegetative period are loosened and hilled several times, thereby spontaneous development of the site occurs. If sawdust, compost, roofing material are spread between the plants, then the weeds under them will also die. See how it looks in the photo.
- How else can you develop part of the garden? Our grandmothers put the overgrown lands in order in such an original way: they scattered humus in a thick layer on the area with weeds so that it completely covered the site, several layers of old newspapers or thick cardboard were laid on top. Fertile soil was poured over this shelter, in which, as in ridges, seeds of beets and rutabagas were sown. It is possible to plant seedlings of tomatoes on such a site, only for this you need to make a hole in the newspapers. Plants will grow quickly as the grass begins to rot, enriching the soil with micronutrients. By autumn, there will be no trace of weeds on the plot developed in this way, and you will provide yourself with vegetables.
- Do you want to make a lawn of flowers? Nothing complicated. Cover the flower bed with cardboard or newspaper and plant seedlings of your favorite flowers.
- To resolve the issue of how to quickly remove weeds from an overgrown area, gardeners give a lot of useful advice. Many of them use green manure, sowing them densely in the area from which weeds must be removed. It can be rye, mustard, vetch. At the same time, we do not plow the area. During the season, the grass is mowed several times, without removing the dried plants. Then the area is covered with a black film. Weeds and mowed green manure perepere during the season, enriching the soil and improving its structure.
- You can clean the site with sunflowers, bush beans, which will prevent weeds from growing. Sowing seeds should be dense, no more than 5 cm between seeds, between rows up to 15 cm. Weeding will take about a month, while the plants are small. Sunflower, gaining strength, builds up a powerful root system, taking food from the weeds. At the same time, bush beans cover the bed with leaves, cover the soil from the sun, preventing the earth from overgrowing with weeds.
Cleaning a large area
We will prepare the rest of the dacha area for next year. Where to start work:
- First, the summer cottage is cleared of shrubs. They are cut down and burned. Ashes do not need to be thrown away, this is an excellent fertilizer. It is scattered across the site.
- If the grass is tall, then it is advisable to mow it first. It is better to remove the cut weeds in a separate pile, since it will still come in handy.
- We plow or dig the territory. We turn the soil with a shovel, break up the lumps. You can also use pitchforks. In this case, the soil must be cleared of large roots. The dug up area can be left under pairs. During the summer, as a rule, the earth is dug up again when weeds appear.
- Lay mowed weeds in a thick layer on top. Peat, sawdust, straw, hay, old roofing material, boards, even cardboard and newspapers can be used for these purposes. This is done in order to stop the access of light to the weeds.
- Many gardeners use black covering material for this purpose. At the same time, it can be laid on an unplowed area on top of the weeds. This area under the film will remain until next spring.
How to easily clear an overgrown area:
Lawn preparation
It is difficult to imagine a cottage without flower beds and lawns. To develop land for a lawn, you will have to resort to other operations.
With the help of a bayonet shovel, the sod, pierced by the roots of perennial weeds, is removed by five centimeters. Sod with fertile soil is not thrown away, but stacked up to dry with the roots up. Next year, you will have ready-made soil for adding to the ridges.
And now about how to make a lawn. The resulting trench needs to be dug up, fertile soil added, well shed and sown with lawn grasses. A beautiful lawn will appear in a month. To prevent weeds from growing around it, cover the paths with peat or old newspapers.
Herbicides in weed control
If nothing has ever been planted in the area under the summer cottage, then weeds cannot be quickly dealt with without chemical preparations. Today, to clean the suburban area, you can use various effective preparations:
- Tornado;
- Hurricane;
- Roundup and others.
As a rule, it is necessary to start the destruction of weeds when the plants have not yet entered the flowering phase. For processing, choose a windless hot day without precipitation for 10-12 hours. Treated weeds first turn yellow, and then after 2 weeks, die off along with the root system. After that, they are removed from the site and burned. Ash for fertilizer should not be used.
It is advisable not to plant cultivated plants in the country until next spring. But siderates need to be sown. They will improve the soil, enrich it with nutrients and improve its structure. In the spring we will plow the land and plant the necessary crops.
When treating the site with herbicides, you must use personal protective equipment and observe safety precautions.
To summarize
It is impossible to tell about all the methods of cleaning an overgrown summer cottage in one article, we have chosen the most popular ones. Each gardener will decide for himself how he will destroy weeds in an overgrown dacha. The main thing is not to stop at the results achieved and not to give green enemies the opportunity to strangle cultivated plants. Then your beds will delight you with a bountiful harvest of vegetables, berries and fruits.