I mentioned in an earlier post that my family owns a cabin on a lake about 80 miles from home. This cabin has a large gravel area for parking but no one bothered to lay down a weed barrier before they put the gravel down so it is a giant weed patch that we can’t mow. I know there a lot of you out there with your own giant weed patches wondering what to do and I am here to tell you I found the answer: Read below…
Of course my mom and dad think I should dump a few gallons of Round Up out there and call it a day (I think my mom’s exact words were “poison is good”). I can’t bring myself to do that since there are fish, salamanders, turtles, snakes, and more importantly my kids, that live in the water all summer long. The lake is about 50 feet from our weed patch and I might as well pour the Round Up directly into it. I did some research on-line and the only answers I found weren’t too helpful. There are two things that come up time and time again when you Google “natural weed killers”, the first is boiling water from a tea kettle. Really? Don’t you think if the patch was so small I could cover it with a tea kettle’s worth of water I would just yank the things out myself? The second option, which I have actually tried at home with limited success, was vinegar. Again, my area is just too big, even for the Costco sized vinegar bottle.
So here is what did work – a blow torch, or flame thrower if you prefer. I was talking to a friend whose neighbor chooses this type of weed control and so I took a chance and bought “The Inferno” at Lowes. I hooked this wand up to the propane tank from our gas grill and I was off. I must admit I felt a bit like Rambo out there burning all of the weeds up but it worked like a charm! A couple of caveats though: It is great for a big gravel parking lot, but not sure I’d use it around my home or anything else flammable. Also, choose your footwear wisely. In hindsight I guess Crocs probably weren’t the best choice. The soles now look like a piece of pizza covered with melted cheese. Nonetheless, I highly recommend this method – it was fairly inexpensive (about the same price as a big bottle of weedkiller), it was quick, it was easy, and it makes you feel really tough when you’re using your flame thrower:). Best of all though, was knowing that I wasn’t using any toxic products on the ground where my kids run barefoot or near the lake where we all play in the water.
OK, maybe a slight exaggeration....
Wow gonna have to try that. It would probably be pretty easy to convince my 16 year old son to help out with the yard work if I told him he gets to use a FLAMETHROWER. Gonna have to check this out, especially if its not too expensive as you said.