How to get rid of and restrict growth of grass and weeds in the plantations?

Hello All;

I had done plantation of Drumsticks & Mangoes last year. After the rains have gone, The entire cultivated land has got a massive growth of weeds and grass.

I am attaching some pics. Some natural mulch of leaves and an intermediate cleaning around all saplings in mid monsoon did help a bit. But now the grass has taken over completely.

How do I get rid of this?

  1. Right now I am buying a brush cutter. This will atleast help clear off the land for now.
  2. How do I avoid this king of growth in future?

Please help.

Thanks.


Bhayya there is no use of bush cutter because the bush cutter will cut the Grass only upper Portion and it will not root out the weed from Roots.Hence it is better to get your Land Plough with Cultivatotor using Tractor.If Tractor cannot go use small Tractor other wise also you can use small weeders. Kindly call me after 10th because Iam out of Station and will advise in detail.
MANNE.Sn,
Vasudha Green farms,
vasudhagreenfarms@gmail.com,
9133498366

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I would grow a crop of my own in place of weeds to limit weeds from growing. Such crops as cowpea/horsegram/tur or even maize. Idea is to grow crops which cultivate land by sending their roots in depth, fix nitrogen, companions for the main plantation crop, fodder also. In the end overall soil health is improved as do the plantation growth and productivity.

Surely I will Call you after 10th.

Thanks.

Hi,

Thanks for your reply… I cant take tractor in… Its a bit narrow for tractor. No small tractors available for rent anywhere around. Which crops can I grow by broadcasting seeds before onset of next monsoons? or generally broadcasting and flooding water…?

I do not believe a tractor can address such high growth; any implement would get stuck every other minute - maybe you could try disc plough but I am not sure of that either. You may have to brushcut the growth first to be able to run a tractor.

As gunda suggested, it would be good to replace the weeds with green manure plants over a period of time. You may then cut and place the plant material as mulch or ‘crimp’ it if possible. Search for crimper on the forum to read about this.

shri1885,
For me huruli or horse gram has been the easiest. It grows both in monsoon and also in winter using dew. Do try to find out which short term crops are generally grown in your area. Use atleast 2-3 times recommended seed quantity and three to four types of seeds. I use horse gram,cowpea mix.

I am assuming at least a pair of bullocks/oxen are available for plough. After broadcasting you will have to cover seeds with soil using haluve ( a toothed harrow). If ploughing is not possible seed balls should be used.

Thanks a lot Chandra and Gunda for your replies.

Here are different dimensions to the problem.

  1. Main Crop - Drumstick and Mango
  2. Irrigation - Drip Lines and network of Main Lines and Sub Lines
  3. Land Type - It also have quite a good quantity of rocks… Cant call is rocky but alrest 30% of big rocks.
  4. Resources, Know How and other limitations - I am a newbie. People in the village just do Lady Finger after monsoons while they have some water in stream nearby. All borewells and streams go dry by Jan, except ours. People just do selective crops. In last one year of my venture I have tried Cucumber (Failed due to NilGais which further also exploited my drumstick plantations), Watermelon (Failed- I was in States and the careteaker harvested them early)… But in both cases the weeds gave major trouble in addition to NilGai’s…
    There are no small size tractors. Even if electricity goes, I have to drive there and arrange for electrician etc etc to get things started.
    Labor charges are too steep. Basically even normal resources aren’t easily available :stuck_out_tongue:

Options and Response that may not work.

  1. Cannot use tractor… Tried it in one lane and failed. It broke one subline plus pulled out more rocks to the surface which would make use of brushcutter further difficult.
  2. Cows/Bullocks/Buffaloes no more used in the village :smiley:… There are a few cows and buffalos in village but I havent seen anyone using a bullock in last one-two year.
  3. Usage of power tiller or weeder many damage it due to presence of rocks in the said area.

My next steps (that i could make out… Please help by adding or correcting me)

  1. Use brushcutter wherever possible and employ labor to do the entire area cleanup.
  2. Add mulch to existing plantations (Thinking of dried leaves and foilage, cardboards and newspaper shreds. Would the same grass which would be cut, work as mulch?)
  3. Employ people and remove all visible rocks on the surface so that Brushcutter can be used more confidently next time.
  4. Plan for cover crop.

My Questions:

  1. Ploughing etc is not possible… Is this the right way of making seedballs? facebook.com/media/set/?set … 222&type=3

  2. While planning for cover crops I would want to plan for crop which can be harvested by a brushcutter. Want to reduce labor dependency and cost. - Is this even realistic? what would be those crops be?

  3. I was thinking of plastic mulch for the existing plantations during monsoon… How to I do a plastic sheet mulching for existing plantations? Wouldn’t I have to cut it from one side to center and then cover it with stones? Is it advisable to use plastic?

Sorry for a lengthy post… I just have too many questions, being a newbie.

Thanks a ton

Hi Shri,
we have these problems in our land in northern maharashtra .
To remove boulders what you have do is hire laborers from village when they do not have any work, probably Feb-Mar etc .
For Neelgai, natural fence, solar fence seems only economical option . We are also struggling to make natural fence of sagargota, we will try during coming monsoon .

Thanks & Regards,
Prashant

Thank you Bhayya for your Confidence Kept on us. The present Subsidy has been increased to 75-80K per unit in such be the case you can get it at Es 70 K or so . If you go for Power weedier it will costs you around 45 K if you want i will arrange it if you are in Hyderabad.As our Brother Gunda said these Horse Gram/Red Gram/Black Gram/Green gram also cannot control weed. There is a Proverb that " ONE YEAR SEEDING IS SEVEN YEARS WEEDING". Hence it is better to weed out by continuous ploughing in between the crops before weeding , weed can be controlled. For Further details Pl . contact 9133498366 if you are in Hyderabad or in Telangana I will Arrange at Subsidised Price.

Mulch can be anything organic; just take precautions against fire, and against critters while you walk.
Janumu/Sunnhemp may be a good choice - grows nice and tall, fixes N and is easy to cut.
I have terrible problems disposing the plastic mulch. If it gets shredded before you begin removing it, it just gets scattered as small pieces that are hard to get rid of.

Shri1885,
You will need thousands of seedballs. There are several videos on internet about how to make seedballs. Videos are better than images. Take a look at multiple videos and chose a procedure that suits you.

Remember that for seed (whether weed or crop) to germinate, it needs light/warmth,moisture,suitable soil structure. The moment you remove one of these, the weeds will stop emerging. Ploughing during times when moisture is available in open is ideal for weed germination, since you are bringing new seeds to top soil and conditions for them to thrive. Start with mulching, minimize and stop ploughing totally over a period of time and in the long run plantation should shade out entire area.

Ref shri 1885 thread,since the undergrowth pertains to removal of weeds etc in an orchard like area,I will like to draw members’ attention towards my thread where lemongrass plantation was discussed.In any orchard if moderate sunlight comes,lemon grass plantation will ensure that no weeds grow underneath.The same lemon grass can be used for oil extraction.Nothing( no weeds) can grow when lemon grass starts forming clumps in the field.Thus without use of any machine or chemical you will get rid of problem area i.e. weeds in the land.Regarding other crops(except orchards) this formula won’t work,so please remove those weeds through agricultural tools.

Hello Shri,
Since you say the land cannot be ploughed by oxen/tractor, it will be hard for you to broadcast the seeds. Going the seedball way or manual seed driller will be a laborious task. But if you can manage to somehow get a pair of oxen/bullock, it will solve the problem. You can go for horse gram (very easy to grow) or taller varieties like sunhemp/daincha etc. I have used horse gram, green gram, pigeon pea, sunhemp and daincha and personally like horse gram.
Cutting the weeds by brush cutter will not help. You will need to do this on a regular basis since the weeds grow back more vigorously. Using the cut weeds as mulch is not a viable option as the cut weeds will be a very negligible quantity and will not cover the entire area that you cleaned up. So you will have to get extra mulch from outside.
The other option would be to plant mucuna bracteata manually (you don’t need a high seed rate as it spreads really fast). So hiring few lady laborers should do the trick.

Good luck.

Biju

Hi. Shri
I had the same problem in my farm after trying everything and all options
I had find out we need to kill all grass plants and weeds
Plugging and planting other crops don’t solve the problem as grass seeds are present in soil and grass will grow again once water is available
I had used glycel which contains glyphosate chemical which will burn the grass and the seeds present in soil
We need to spray the glycel on the grass and leave it for 3 weeks after 3 weeks we can plant anything
For 1 hector of land you need only 3 liters of glycel it work outs cheaper solution
Thanks
Ibrahim khan
9900998788
Ibkhan80@yahoo.com

Boss ,

Instead of going for plastic mulching you can go for cotton mulching. The lifespan of cotton mulch is more, it allows water to drip in and also solves your purpose. You are also discourageing use of plastic.

Thank you Khan sab,

But your Contention is beyond Facts. The Glycel ill kill the Small Grass.
But it will not spoil the seed of the Grass.As has already been Stated
the Proverb I am once again referring.“ONE YEAR SEEDING IS SEVEN
YEARS WEEDING” in the case of Weed.continuous Ploughing when
there is no crop and Manual weeding during the crop. Using of Chemical
weedicides will Spoil the Soil Structure but weed will raise when moisture
is avilable . It is a Fact that the Glycel or any other weedicide will not
spoil the seed of the weed . It is my Practical experience.

Plastic mulching will turn out very expensive if not used reqularly and make sure the weeds around the plastic mulch are removed regularly. I also have the same problem but I am going with Brush cutter to cut the weeds, even though the roots are still there I beleif is over a period of time if we continue using the brush cutter there is no place for the new weeds to come and also the cut weeds will act as a mulch and also protect the mositure of the soil.

I would like to suggest this is a laborious process and it would take considerable amount of time for the weeds to get cleared. My attendant takes around a week to remove 1 Ac of weeds.

Hope this helps and would like to hear from others as well.

Hi…

Thanks for your reply. Can you please advice me the common name for “mucuna bracteata”?

Regards;
Sujay

Hi,

Would you please be able to explain cotton mulch?

Thanks