Hello everyone! We've just recently moved to a new home and are trying to get our garden in order. We've tackled a few of our beds already but we have one that is full of a certain plant and we are unsure if it is a weed or not. I'm leaning toward a weed, but figured I'd get some of your expert opinions before pulling it out. Thank you in advance!!
WEED WEED WEED it is a terrible WEED. you will need to spray it with a weed killer such as round up. I hate round up with a passion but please believe me when I say "round up is your friend" with this weed. it is called mugwort. it grows via a rhizomous mat that is un pullable. you can not pull it and pull the roots out. I have battled it for about 10 years.. I finally gave in last year and bought round up to kill it off. just make sure you don't have any flowers ( which are very unimpressive) when trying to kill it. if in doubt weed eat it off by about 1/2 and then spray it with the weed killer.
My garden is full of it. Artemesia or mugwort. If you have sandy soil it is easier to ge rid of. However if you have heavy clay it is much harder to get out. It is one of the most tenacious weeds though.
It is not blooming or bearing seeds, so pulling it out before it blooms and makes seeds will eliminate all existing plants more effectively than spraying anything, which leaves all of the dead (and then toxic) debris that you would likely still want to remove. This would require about the same pulling effort as pulling the live plants, unless all are well and truly killed and left to begin decomposing for at least a few weeks before an attempt to remove is made. Either way, once the ground is disturbed and sun starts shining right on it, whatever existing seeds that are in the soil will be likely to sprout. Another option would be to smother everything under tough, corrugated cardboard covered with a layer of mulch, or other organic material, soil if nothing else is available. Any soil is likely have some kind of seeds that start sprouting. Blocking the light while physically preventing plants from standing up and growing will cause them to die. Using these organic materials will mean you do not need to remove it, just dig holes (after all under the smother is dead - you don't want it coming back up through the holes from going in too soon) to add new plants as desired. These plants are tall, so you may want to use a shear, weed trimmer, or mower, or even stomp on them, to knock them down and making laying the cardboard much easier. They will add excellent organic matter under the cardboard to enrich the soil.
