I had the honour of joining my good friend Katherine on her annual jaunt to the Van Dusen plant sale in Vancouver this year. If I wasn't inspired to plant and do some good old fashioned weed pulling before that visit, I sure was after! The plants there were not only incredibly priced, but they were being sold by people who actually had a hand in growing them. I was reminded before I actually purchased anything to keep in mind that we have a lot on the go this summer and that plants don't water themselves. I'm proud to say that I was very conservative in my purchases. I walked out of there with a succulent pot (I love those little guys), three mini lavender plants, and three various other plants that all read "poor care" and "drought resistant" on the care instructions - jackpot!
Step one is to get the two circular beds ready for planting. This involves a whole lot of weeding and thinning of the existing plants and ground cover that's in them. I got the smaller of the two beds all weeded and cleaned out a week ago. When I went back to it today, there were already weeds that have grown back. The landscape fabric has been through the ringer and is starting to tear in numerous places. I know I need to rip it all up and redo the fabric, plant my new drought resistant plants and then fill it in again with the pea gravel but before I rip it all up, I want to make sure I kill all of the weeds. As we have two dogs that roam free on the property, I don't really want to use a chemical treatment on the area like round-up as I don't want to harm the dogs. Enter the fabulous world of Pinterest!
I've seen a "weed killer" recipe posted on both Pinterest and Facebook many times by different people which is all essentially the same recipe. The bonus is that none of the ingredients in this recipe will cause harm to the dogs. Fantastic! I took a trip to the grocery store to pick up my weed killer ingredients, then a quick stop at Home Depot to pick up my sprayer and back home to concoct and wait for the results.
Non-Toxic Weed Killer Recipe:
1/2 Gallon Apple Cider Vinegar
1/4 Cup Table Salt
1/2 Tsp Dawn Dish Soap
Mix Ingredients in a spray bottle and spray weeds thoroughly.
They say the Dawn dish soap strips the weeds of their protective oils so the vinegar can work with deadly force. I used this whole four liter bottle to spray a circular bed with an eight foot diameter this morning. When I checked on them seven hours later, the weeds have all changed from a thriving, "we're going to take over this garden bed" colour, to a grey-ish, "we're quickly dying" colour. I will warn you though that some of what I sprayed was grass that has grown into the bed because of absent minded lawn mowers aiming the grass clipping spewer into to bed (yes, I'm talking about myself). I can report that this solution also seems to work on grass so be precise when you're spraying!
While planning out my weed killing spree, I had the itch to start planting NOW! So I took a trip to our local garden shop, Swan Lake Nurseries, and bought some perennials to fill my wine barrel planters with and some annuals for a couple of other pots we have laying around. I tried to stick with my master plan of picking up poor care and drought resistant plants but a couple of good care ones may have snuck into my cart and they were just too pretty to put back. I have planted one of the two wine barrels, the other one still needs to be moved into place by a strong individual before I can plant it, and the smallest of the three pots out front. I'm pretty happy with my results so far!
Anytime I dip my hands into the soil, water some plants or admire others' handy work in the garden, I think of my Grampa, David Hunter. Though I seem to have inherited my mom's "black thumb", I still believe that I have it in me to turn around my gardening fate. My Grampa started, owned and ran David Hunter Garden Centres in Vancouver, Surrey and for a time in Port Coquitlam when they had the store there. I have so many memories of my Grampa coming down from the Sunshine Coast to stay with us and fix our gardens. I was also lucky enough to spend my whole summer up at their place on the Sunshine Coast growing up and my Grampa was always out toodling in the garden. I am hoping to do my Grampa proud and get these gardens up to snuff to send him some pictures of what I've done this year. There's still a lot of work to do but now that I have my weed killer and some of my flowers planted, I'm feeling a little less overwhelmed and more excited about the end product. Here's hoping the poor care and drought resistant plants hold up their end of the bargain!
Health and happiness,
Lisa
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