Pull Wet, Hoe Dry… and Poison Ivy

June 7th, 2010

Weeding beets with my trusty "compost harvester" (i.e. 5-gallon bucket).

   Add a little rain to warm soil and that’s a perfect recipe for June weeds. You’re not imagining things – they did spring up almost overnight.

   Have you ever heard the old weed saying, “Pull when wet, hoe when dry?”

   There’s truth to that. Weeds come out much easier when the soil is damp and loose after a rain. That’s a good time to yank them. Hoeing isn’t as effective then because some of those weeds that you uproot but don’t remove will re-root in damp soil. In a dry spell, dropped weeds will lay there and wilt.

   Most of the time, I’m a yanker, not a sprayer. I spent a couple of hours over the weekend pulling weeds out of the vegetable patch, out of pathways and out of a few areas that I didn’t mulch this spring.

   I look at it as “harvesting compost.” I go on regular weed patrols, carrying a trusty 5-gallon bucket around to make deposits. Young weeds not only come out easier, but they haven’t gone to seed. That makes them great candidates for fueling the compost bin.

   Pulling young is a key strategy of weed defense. Let a dandelion or thistle go to seed and you’ll have hundreds (if not thousands) of seeds per plant blowing around. Those can haunt you for years.

   Here’s another weed saying: “One year weeds, seven years seed.” That one’s true, too.

   The good news is that weed sprouting typically tapers off around the end of June. So if you stay ahead of things in the next few weeks, it’ll get easier from then on.

   One weed I’ve seen a lot in my travels lately has been the dreaded poison ivy. It’s thriving right now, and if you’re not sure what it looks like, this is one plant to really get to know.

Poison ivy (leaves of 3) and Virginia creeper (leaves of 5).

   Here’s a photo showing poison ivy (leaves of three) growing among non-poisonous Virginia creeper (leaves of five). These are often confused. A third weed saying that’s worth following: “When in doubt, stay out.”

   Even if you know poison ivy, it’s easy to accidentally grab it while you’re yanking mixed bouquets of weeds. Wearing gloves helps, but not everyone keeps them on (me included). Or maybe your gloves are like mine – holes in the finger tips.

   You can usually head off a skin irritation if you wash with soap and cold water within 15 minutes of getting poison ivy’s urishiol oil on your skin. There’s also a variety of protectants and other poison-fighting strategies in a column I did on this, which is posted here. 

   Whatever you do, avoid weed-whacking beds where you suspect there’s poison ivy. I ran into a guy who admitted doing that last week, and he learned that power tools are great for throwing urushiol all over the place. Plus the poison ivy just grows back anyway.

   Also don’t burn poison ivy. The oil gets in the smoke and can seriously irritate your lung lining. And don’t think, like one of my buddies did, that you won’t get poison if you pull it down when the leaves aren’t out in winter. That oil is still very effective in winter.