Best Way to Remove Weeds from a Large Area — Don’t Miss This!

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You can rid your garden of weeds with various methods. Some people are happy to use herbicides to remove weeds, others prefer to use natural methods.

In the end, which way you go depends largely on how determined you are to eradicate the weeds versus how strongly you feel about the herbicide issue.

There are many options to keep your yard looking its best. While high maintenance is the best option, not everyone has the time or ability for it.

Below, I offer different methods for keeping weeds in check, which you might find useful.

 

Best Way to Remove Weeds from a Large Area

To remove weeds from a large area, you can opt to dig up the weeds manually, destroy the weeds with a chemical weed killer or herbicide, or use a natural method of removing weeds by spraying them with a white vinegar solution or salt.

 

The Best Way to Remove Weeds from a Large Area (But also the Most Time-intensive)

The best weed removal method is to dig them up manually. This will ensure that every weed, including the leaves and flowers, is removed.

This is a problem because it depends on how large the land is.

Hand pulling weeds is best for small weeds with a shallow root system. This means you will need to identify which plants are unwanted wild plants and which are weeds.

If you are considering this route, it is a good idea to use gardening gloves. They will make your job much easier.

You might need to use tools to deal with more stubborn weeds that have a stronger root system. This would typically involve using a small shovel to lift the weed up to the point that you can pull it out of the ground.

Weeding tip: Never forget to pull the weed gently from the ground. Do not yank or pull at the weed.

If you do, it can cause the weed to snap, leaving the roots in place before you remove them all. Shortly afterward, the weed will appear again because you won’t have really destroyed it.

 

Removing Weeds using Only All-natural Methods

Not all weed killers have to be chemical or herbicidal. It’s surprisingly easy to make all-natural weedkillers.

You just need extra-strength white vinegar to do a proper job. White vinegar is the strongest and purest form of vinegar you can buy, which is why it is well-suited for this job.

First, obtain white vinegar with a 10-to-20% acetic acid content. At this level of acidity, the vinegar is strong enough to burn leaves, the roots of weeds, even skin!

Health-and-safety tip: Always protect yourself and wear gloves when spreading the vinegar around your yard. As explained above, the strength of vinegar you need to use for killing weeds is certainly strong enough to cause you severe burns.

When you’ve purchased the vinegar, squirt it on the weeds with a spray bottle.

Make sure you spray not just the weed but also it’s base. You have to spray all around the bottom of the weed to make sure that the vinegar gets to its roots.

Only when the weeds’ roots are dead are they really gone and can’t return to your yard.

Weeding tip: Keep in mind that vinegar is an equal-opportunity killer. It won’t discriminate between weed and prized rose, or weed and carefully planted vegetables. 

If you spray it, you kill it. It’s that simple.

 

Not just Vinegar…

 

Use Salt to Destroy Weeds

Salt kills weeds and stops them from growing in the soil.

Create a saline solution by mixing the salt with water and then pour the solution onto the ground at the bottom of the weeds. (Just as with vinegar, you need to ensure that the salt will get to the weeds’ roots.)

But, there’s a catch with this method, though: most plants cannot grow in salinized soil.

As salt stays in the soil for a long time, this method of weeding is absolutely unsuitable if the goal is to replant the area.

 

Use Fire to Destroy Weeds

You need a tool called a “weed torch” to destroy weeds by fire. Each weed torch has a gas burner that fires flames at weeds to incinerate them on contact.

Weed torches are easy to use, and some folk finds them fun. They can also be used to work in tight spaces or difficult nooks.

If you’re careful (and I suppose you’d better be, working with fire), weed torches are also a great choice for working around flowers and vegetables.

There are 2 caveats you should think about, though. The first is that using a weed torch is slower than spraying a herbicide when clearing a large area.

The second is that weed torches do not destroy weeds’ roots, meaning that this method requires repeated applications.

 

Open Secret: When to do Weeding

One thing you probably haven’t thought much about is when you should start weeding. Unbeknownst to most people, the best time to get weeding is when the soil is moist.

You should always remove weeds from the soil when it is moist. This will make it easier if you’re working with your hands or make it easier for the herbicide to get to the weeds’ roots if you’re working with a weedkiller.

Avoid removing weeds from the soil if it is too dry. This increases the probability of the weed breaking off and its roots being left in the dirt.

Tip: If rain is not forecasted, just hose down the area you wish to weed to speed things up. (Let the area soak overnight so that the soil’s completely moist.)

 

Frequently Asked Questions about the Best Way to Remove Weeds from a Large Area

 

What is a permanent solution to keeping weeds at bay?

In a garden or vegetable patch, unfortunately, there isn’t one. Weeds are as much a fact of life as death and taxes. However, if you have a patch of land that you’re happy to urbanize, you could always pave the land or lay tarmac on it. As soon as you deny land the opportunity to grow plants, you deny weeds a place to germinate and get started too.

 

Are there any natural barriers that can help prevent or manage weeds?

Two natural barriers come to mind: mulch and corn gluten meal. Put down a thick layer of the right kind of mulch to suppress weeds and even to provide the soil with extra nutrients for when you’re ready to get planting again. Apply the corn gluten meal to the ground twice yearly, early in fall and again early in spring.

 

Afterword: The Best Way to Remove Weeds from a Large Area

Clearing out weeds takes time which you’ll certainly not want to waste on ineffective methods.

Spraying weed killer is one of the best and easiest ways to kill weeds in large areas. Not every herbicide is a man-made chemical.

There are natural weedkillers, some of which you may already have in your home.

If you have the time, ability, and energy, manually getting rid of weeds is the best way to deal with them, bar none.