I was sent a bottle of Perfectly Natural Weed & Grass Killer to try and the timing was perfect because I've had a weed explosion in the gaps between my flagstones and in the crushed gravel paths surrounding my vegetable beds. You get a little busy and suddenly you've got a lot of weeds. I tried hula-hoeing some and pulling others, but really didn't have the time to get on my hands and knees and pull every single weed in my yard.Enter Perfectly Natural Weed & Grass Killer.
I'd read about homemade vinegar concoctions as weed killers but also read that the typical 5% acetic acid concentration in table vinegar wasn't really enough to kill weeds while the recommended 20% concentration was strong enough to blind a person.
Perfectly Natural Weed & Grass Killer, however, has the following breakdown.
Active Ingredient: Clove oil..... 8%
Inert ingredients: Vinegar (maximum 8% acetic acid in solution)..... 90%... Lecithin.... 2%.
It's reportedly "100% Organic and Family Safe"
Manufacturer recommendations include wearing eye protection and gloves during application, but it's nice not having to worry about lingering herbicide toxicity in the garden. The bottle label doesn't boast OMRI certification, so I will need to look into the caliber of approval it's receiving from other respected organic gardening organizations and practitioners. Having OMRI "cred" really makes it a no-brainer for me.
Would I buy this product or something like it? Very likely. In fact, I'll bet if I'd used this fast-acting herbicide sooner, I probably wouldn't have been faced with a weed explosion at all. It would have been more of an easily-handled weed situation.
It's nice to have another weapon in the "less toxic" weed-control arsenal. Wonder if it's sold by the gallon. Peaceful Valley Farm Supply sells a similar product called BurnOut II, containing 4% Clove Oil and 93% vinegar (which I assume to be 5% acetic acid), lecithin, water, citric acid and mineral oil.
Perfectly Natural is sold online at Unique Products Are Us and locally at nurseries, KMart, WalMart, and Fred Meyer.
I hope the manufacturers aren't equating "natural" and "organic" with "safe." Clove oil and acetic acid (with lecithin as an emulsifier to make them mix) are at least non-toxic, but do handle them carefully and don't let the spray get in your eyes. 20% is a pretty high concentration for any acid, and while acetic acid isn't as corrosive as, say, sulfuric acid, it can still cause chemical burns to tender parts of the anatomy. And the clove oil itself could cause irritation in that high a concentration. Use with the same common sense you would with any other garden chemical.
ReplyDeleteAfter all, it does kill plants dead.
Now, if you want another "natural" solution to weeds in gravel, stone, and concrete areas, check out the solution that has my teenage son actually asking to help with the weeding: http://tinyurl.com/jotx9
Yes, let's not confuse "organic" with "safe". You do have to be careful with any product, whether synthetic-based or organic.
ReplyDeletePerfectly Natural uses 8% acetic acid, not 20%. I wouldn't go near the 20% stuff, even in a haz-mat suit.
P.S. My 13-year-old son would LOVE to use the flaming weed killer your son uses gleefully. His mommy, however, would get the vapors and have to lie down a lot.
ReplyDeleteLet's see, what would I feel safe allowing him to use to rid our garden of weeds? Boiling water? Nope. Fire? Nope. Herbicides? Nope. His hands? You betcha! ;-)
I also discovered this weed killer this year (saw it at Walmart) and I'v been using it on thistle with good results. Sometimes I have to go back and spray again, but it works.
ReplyDeleteYou know Angela the photo ABOVE the one of the weed product..looks like an art piece to me!! Take out the cations
ReplyDelete(treated,untreated,untreated put a frame around it and what a great art pc.!! I"m just an earthy kind of girl!
Very helpful, Angela. Thanks.
ReplyDelete