380 



WEEDING. 



raised up by a fork, weeding-hook, spade, trowel, or some other implement, 

 which penetrates deeper than the hoe ; and great care must be taken with 

 underground stems, such as those of the couch-grass, the small field convol- 

 vulus, the hedge nettle, and others, to take up every joint, otherwise the 

 result will merely be the propagation of these weeds by division. Among 

 growing crops, the two-pronged fork (fig. 34, in p. 135) is the only safe 

 instrument' for eradicating root- weeds, for reasons which we omit, because 

 like many other reasons which we do not give, we consider them sufficiently 

 obvious to the reader who has perused the preceding chapters of tliis work 

 with due attention. 



816. Weeds in gravel-walks should always be taken out by weeding, and 

 never, in our opinion, by hoeing and raking ; and for amateurs, who do not 

 wish to stoop, there is the implement, fig. 30, in p. 135, as well as the 

 Guernsey weeding-prong, fig. 165, in p. 238. Salt has been used to destroy 

 vegetation on walks, but its effects do not last above a year, as the first 

 winter's rain washes it into the subsoil ; besides, the attraction of salt for 

 moisture has been found (Gard. Chron for 1841, p. 846) to encourage the 

 growth of mosses and other cryptogamic plants to such an extent, as to give 

 the walks a slimy, slippery surface after rain, and during winter and spring. 

 Sulphate of copper (the blue vitriol of druggists) effectually destroys moss 

 and other plants, is more durable in its effects than salt, and is not attended 

 with the same humidity and attraction for the seeds of cryptogamic plants. 

 It must not be forgotten, in using salt and other compositions for destroying 

 weeds on walks in kitchen-gardens and shrubberies, that the roots of wall 

 and espalier trees generally find their way under gravel, and consequently 

 that if such mixtures are used for two or three years in succession, they 

 may destroy the trees as well as the weeds. In some gardens, in order to 

 destroy weeds in walks at the least expense, the walks are hoed and raked, 

 and frequently left in this state without being rolled. In wet climates and 

 retentive soils, where walks are covered with loose rough gravel in order 

 that they may be walked on immediately after rain, as is the case in some 

 country residences in Scotland, this is proper ; but where walks are made of 

 binding gravel or sand, we consider this practice in bad taste, because it 

 confounds the character of the surface of the walk, which to walk comfort- 

 ably on ought to be firm, even, and smooth, with that of the dug border, 

 which ought to be always more or less rough to facilitate the admission of 

 air and moisture to the roots of the plants. In a shady shrubbery walk, or 

 a gravel- walk through a wood, the appearance of moss is to our eyes much 

 less offensive than would a surface hoed and raked, however free the latter 

 might be of vegetation. 



817. Weeds in lawns or on grass-walks include all the broad-leaved plants 

 which spring up among the proper grasses, not even excepting the clovers, 

 commonly sown with them to give the grass a better hold of the scythe in 

 mowing. All these broad-leaved plants, and even all broad-leaved grasses, 

 such as the cocksfoot, ought to be weeded out if it is intended to have a per- 

 fect lawn, which to be so ought to resemble a piece of cloth in uniformity of 

 texture and appearance. The worst weeds in lawns are those which have very 

 broad and flat reclining leaves, which the scythe is apt to pass over, leaving 

 them to feed the roots, such as certain species of plantago, dandelion, &c. ; 

 and these are the more difficult to eradicate, because they have tap-roots, fur- 

 nished with adventitious buds which seldom fail to be developed, unless the 



