Vinegar Kills Lawn

June 11, 2013Leave a comment

An accident got me curious in organic weed killers. We made a giant volcano out on the lawn:

It effectively killed the lawn. I have read that household vinegar is not very effective as a weed killer. But this proved otherwise. So I filled up sprayer and sprayed a portion of the large weed field out back.

The advantage of this stuff is it is dilute vinegar so I didn’t mind when my little kids went out and helped looking like this:

After ten days, here are my experiences with household vinegar as a weed killer:

You have to drown the plants to kill them, or even notice leaf browning.
It works more as a contact herbicide, so to get it to die you have to spray it directly on the plant.

It did have some effect. You can see my spray path in the picture above. For some weeds vinegar would work. It didn’t kill the bindweed, but if I had a weed field full of small little annual weeds it might have done all right. If I really wanted an effective weed killer, I would go buy more concentrated stuff, and maybe mixed with clove oil. (Or maybe a product like Natural Weed Control.) However, concentrated vinegar is a strong acid and not something I would handle without protective gear. I would rather handle glyphosate (Round-up), as there isn’t a chance for acid burns with that.

Overall, I think I’ll stick with hand weeding and glyphosate if I need to kill off weeds. But maybe vinegar can have an occasional turn as well. In smaller concentrations, it is often recommended to mix with dish soap and lemon juice, or various oils. Here’s another article that’s interesting, if you’d like more information on vinegar as a weed killer.

Birds

June 11, 20131 Comment

We went out to the bird refuge and drove the loop and dropped in at the visitors center. I enjoyed it and the kids didn’t seem to mind much. When PB got home he said to Dad unprovoked, “We saw a great blue heron on the road.” I was impressed he remembered the name. Curtis practiced saying “Duck” very close to his word-of-the-week “Stuck.”

Otherwise, we are just having good summer fun. I hung up my hammock, we’ve got out the slip’n ‘slide and pool, and I hacked together a small sandbox that Peter loves. The boys keep me busy and on my toes. Sometimes (especially if they or I are tired), things can get a bit exasperating. C is learning how to climb and get into everything, and they both know how to complain. But we have such good fun together too. They make mundane tasks like getting an oil change done new and exciting.

Tree Staking

June 7, 2013

I recently visited a friends house and she had a question on tree staking. I’ve gone back and edited this post, first published four years ago.

Recently, as part of my work at a public garden, I planted several bareroot trees. The trees are doing quite well, but several were leaning, and not quite supporting themselves. This called for tree staking.

Tree staking is often incorrectly done. First of all, you only need to stake a tree if it needs it. Some of my trees would have toppled over or grown at forty five degree angles if I had done nothing to fix it. There were several other trees that I left. The trees were growing relatively straight and supporting themselves. No staking required, even though they were just barely planted.

There are also quite a few common mistakes made. First, the tree should be able to move around a bit. If it can move with the wind, it will grow a stronger, healthier trunk. Second, the material around the trunk should not rub and constrict the bark. With this in mine, I developed a cheap, easy method to stake a tree.

Materials:

Bike tube
Post
twine

I took the bike tube, and cut off about a six inch section, and then split it so it was no longer a tube. I then cut holes on either end, put it around the tree, and threaded the twine through. I placed the post opposite the lean or instability of the trees. Tie the twine on the post, and that’s all. I only did one post per tree, and it worked great. Two posts might be needed in windy areas.

Here’s a picture of how it looked when it was done:

You could use a fancier post or twine to make it look nicer. One last very important reminder: remove it in a year. I have tree die because people leave the staking on. This poor tree isn’t going to last long:

Trip

June 4, 20131 Comment

We went up to Nevada to visit my sister. And my sister takes better pictures, so just go over to her post. I drove about 17 hours alone with the boys. It wasn’t too bad. Not that I would recommend it. The kids didn’t sleep as much as hoped, but we only had one bad tantrum where I had to pull off to the side of the freeway. The trip was a lot of fun.

I’ve been thinking of preschool for PB and have been a little hesitant. I realized why lately. He’s finally old enough to play with and I don’t want to send him away. I still haven’t decided what I want to do, but I have realized I love being his mom. I love doing activities with him, teaching him and playing. He’s old enough play is more involved and actually engaging to me, not just him.

Pictures from Red Butte Gardens

May 25, 2013Leave a comment

This is a lucky picture. I love bees.

Good idea of the day was to take pictures of the flowers I didn’t know with the sign in the frame.

I love the idea of this–it’s a pear tree trained over an arch.

This is mostly all natives, centered around a grove of natuuraling occuring oaks. Beautiful, and I can’t imagine it requires a lot of maintenance.

I loved this viburnum and lilac combo.

Kiddos

May 24, 20133 Comments

Here’s an oatmeal sensory bin even the very oral Mr. C can enjoy-

And here we are, all painting clouds. Don’t worry, Mr. C’s paint is sour cream.

PB is getting better at drawing. These are people. A bit scary, but fun to see him go beyond scribbles.

And this wonderful slip’in’slide came with the apartment. Too bad a tan for PB and Joe wasn’t included.

Potty training with PB is finally gaining some momentum. Except then he got diarrhea. Fun.

Spring Planting

May 23, 2013Leave a comment

We’ve been busy getting the kitchen garden all planted. I still have a few more things to add here and there, but the majority of the work is done.

I picked our first harvest as well. Radishes, winter greens, and spinach. All of which are getting eaten by snails and slugs. I’ve been killing the ones I find with salt out of vengeance.

I had a photo shoot with some radishes. It was longer than any photo shoot I have with my children. Radishes are so much more agreeable and are still quite photogenic.

Now it really is spring and I actually have a garden…and so not much time to sit here and type. Good weather and plants are calling!

Anniversery

May 22, 20133 Comments

Joe and I have been married five years now. We went on an overnight trip, the longest I have been away from my children since they were born. It was amazingly fun. We did everything that we like to do but kids make hard.

First, we hiked up to Lake Blanche in Big Cottonwood Canyon. In chacos, through the snow, for about a half mile. I wasn’t the only one who did it either, we passed a lady (or rather she passed us) also in sandals. It’s a little cold, but on a warm day wasn’t all that bad. Better than getting soggy socks I think.

We also ate sushi, went to a movie, enjoyed the hotel pool, slept without interruption, played disc golf, and went to Red Butte Gardens. I enjoyed such things as getting out the door by 9:00 without trying, and of course spending lots of time with a wonderful husband.

In Defense of Lawn

May 15, 20131 Comment

A guest post by Heather Hoyt who writes at Heather Moments.

I live without lawn right now. My yard is mostly sand–the dirt isn’t completely sand, which I would prefer. It’s just really sandy, mixed in with a fair share of rocks, dead plant material, etc. It’s not very pleasant to play in and it’s not very conducive to grow anything. There are these little dead plant things with sap on them that get stuck to your shoes or feet whenever you go outside and won’t come all the way off even if you scrub really hard.

I miss lawn. I miss flowers too. The closest flower to my house is some penstemon growing on the side of the road a few hundred feet away. I have some trees, but they are responsible for the sticky plant material that ends up on the bottom of your feet.

My yard is just sort of chaos right now. I do rake it out. But I miss having a yard with some order.

I would love a sandbox–a contained sandbox, not just a big pile of sand out there. I still enjoy exploring in the desert–but I wish I could come back to a piece of earth that seemed more contained, more orderly, and less wild.

And most of all, I miss lawn. I want to stretch out on the ground. Sit down without getting my clothes dirty. Run around barefoot. Put down a small kiddie pool without creating a mess of mud. Throw or kick a ball back and forth. Watch clouds. Let my toddler play without having to worry about getting sand and dirty everywhere And have somewhere where if she falls down, she doesn’t get all scraped up.

Dirt is fine, but when that is all you have, you miss the lawn.

Botanizing

May 11, 2013Leave a comment

Flowers from a recent hike:

Western Bluebell (Mertensia oblongifolia)

Longleaf Phlox (Phlox longifolia) and the awful Dyer’s Woad.

And I had no idea what these were before hiking. I’m still learning. But this app sure helps.