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last very long. Pump sprayers have to be maintained, and hose sprayers are mainly for lawns. One of the big bottle sprayers is not a bad solution for 1/4 acre (about 22000 sf, or 220 x 100 feet), if you're in reasonably good shape and not suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome.

Tip: I avoided RoundUp for years, and now I use it without much shame. A little regret. It's really effective with my most intransigent weeds. It acts in hours, finishes the job, and it doesn't contain a lot of metals - the worst for water pollution. Also. buy a few spray bottles, label them "poison" in permanent marker, and store them out of reach of kids. Then buy a few plastic measuring cups and draw an X on the side of each in permanent marker, and store those near the spray bottles. Then you can more easily mix, store and safely use your herbicides.

3: STARVE
Starving weeds is the most interesting way of the three, and probably the least familiar. Weeds like all plants need water, dirt and light to survive and reproduce. Depriving them of water is how RoundUp works (prevents plants from assimilating water).

You can starve them of light, for instance by covering the ground with a temporary tarp during weed growth season. You get a nice patch of damp earth under one of the blue builder's tarps. (Use metal garden stables to hold them down, not the think stakes, which I found break the grommets.) Newsprint and mulch or very heavy mulch by itself works well. You have to do this in combination with some pulling or a lot of spraying for it to work. Avoid thin plastic sheeting - it shreds easily and the weeds grow through it.

You can also starve weeds of light by planting lots of plants you do like. Choose the most appropriate for your natural conditions (sun, soil, water), and they will outperform most weeds. And pull up the few weeds that do get started.

Starve the weeds of water by choosing only low water use plants, or plants that never have to get watered, like natives planted correctly. Your local plant nursery may have some suggestions.

Starve the weeds of soil by killing and pulling them before they seed. Without the seed in the soil, you've got no future weed problem.

Visit my gardening amateur site for more information and resources, including weed identification and more tips: http://www.squidoo.com/gardeni ngamateur.

Learn more about this author, Stephen Shea.
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