[Market-farming] Dealing with Bindweed
Bill Shoemaker
wshoemak at illinois.edu
Wed Apr 29 08:10:33 EDT 2009
Bindweed, like other members of the family (morning glory, sweet potato) have root systems with storage organs for energy. This means that if you kill the shoot system of the plant, it has potential to grow back using that stored energy and latent buds. Roundup will only weaken it unless you spray multiple times and hit it quickly after it begins regrowth. You can do the same by hand, hoeing it, using a weed whip, etc. The key is being timely and persistent. You essentially have to starve the plants of their stored energy. It may take you a couple of seasons with an established population. But when you have that, you almost always have lots of seeds in the ground that germinate in flushes. These can be killed much easier but you need to get them while they are still young. Its hard work but it can be done. I rank bindweed as second only to canada thistle as most difficult in our area, northern Illinois.
Bill
>
> We have always had a bindweed problem in our garden
> plots. We have been very diligent and pull it by
> hand every year, all year. It is getting much
> better. We have also put down mulch (straw), and
> black plastic. The straw helps, but the black
> plastic did nothing. It just grows over to a hole
> and pokes through. I have used chemical, but I don't
> want to spray when the garden is planted. Does
> anyone have an easier way to get rid of it?
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William H Shoemaker, UI-NRES
Sr Research Specialist, Food Crops
St Charles Horticulture Research Center
535 Randall Road St Charles, IL 60174
630-584-7254; FAX-584-4610
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