It Has Begun...

I recently finished re-reading a great book, "The $64 tomato" by William Alexander. It's his story of the trials and tribulations (as well as the rewards) of twenty plus years of gardening, culminating in his realization that when he calculated the cost of his garden, each tomato cost him $64. It's so funny and clever that even if you don't have a garden, you'll find it entertaining. My point in telling you this is because he suffers from many of the same garden woes that I do- grubs, bugs, blight, and most of all- weeds. Like me, William doesn't want to use pesticides or herbicides on his garden. I go a step further and don't even want to use them in my flower beds (who am I kidding, I have one flower bed and it hardly has any flowers in it). As many of you know, I do not enjoy weeding, but this man inspired me partly because he's almost twice my age and weeds with little complaint and partly because it's the beginning of gardening season and I have forgotten the hours upon hours of weeding that I did last year and, therefore, have more motivation. William is a little different than me in that he doesn't want any kind of loud, motorized machines in his garden (i.e. weed wackers or rototillers) which I think is insane, but that's his choice. But my one flower bed was in desperate need of attention and I couldn't fit the rototiller in there. William talked about a shuffle hoe and how great it was compared to a regular hoe. A shuffle hoe has a horseshoe shaped thing on the end (as opposed to the straight piece like a regular hoe) that apparently does a much better job at digging up the weeds by the root and is much easier on your back because you use a back and forth motion instead of hit and drag motion. I was sold. I went to Lowes, paid $17.98, and today I decided to clean up the flower bed.

It did not go well.

First of all, it doesn't get the weed by the root- it simply rips off what's above ground. I could have done that for free with my hands. Second of all, the horseshoe thingy works best when it's perpendicular to the ground, so you have to bend way the hell over in order to place it correctly, which killed my back. It's so very, very dumb and I'm warning you all- do not buy a shuffle hoe. They are junk.

Before

After

You can see, however, that the bed looks much less weedy, but since it just ripped the top leaves off, come tomorrow it will be weedy again. I have also tried Preen organic weed-keep-away pellets and they are also junk. The phlox looks like crap because all this grass and creeping charlie has grown between it and I can't pull it out without pulling the phlox out. You can see why I always end up giving up on this little piece of garden.

Art tilled up the garden for me today. He didn't really do it as a favor to me, he just really enjoys the sight and smell of a freshly tilled garden and who am I to take that pleasure away from him? I think the spring bug finally bit him because he also got the mower out and started and even mowed a little!

A good weekend had by all!