Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum

ALMOST BEEKEEPING - RELATED TOPICS => GARDENING AROUND THE HOUSE => Topic started by: Paynesgrey on March 28, 2010, 11:34:38 pm

Title: You can use geese to get rid of Pigeed(the thorny kind).
Post by: Paynesgrey on March 28, 2010, 11:34:38 pm

Someone posted wanting to know how to get rid of "pigweed". The pigweed I grew up with was closely related to Lambsquarter, and just as delicious steamed with butter and salt or pepper. Not a tough plant to get rid of really, grew in poor soil well. The kind they were talking about on the board, if I identify the pic right, we call "sticks-in-yer-socks" or "Grass-pers" in our part of Texas. Geese normally strongly prefer grass, or the vegetables in your garden :) But we raised our goslings on it sticks to yer socks(sorry don't know the Latin for it), and several other weeds we really wanted them to have a taste for. In addition to grass, Geese will gobble up many broadleaf weeds, but only when the weeds are very young and tender. They won't help with thistles or the really bitter weeds, unless you till and then turn the geese into the area to devour the roots, which don't seem to be bitter to them.

Title: Re: You can use geese to get rid of Pigeed(the thorny kind).
Post by: suprstakr on March 30, 2010, 11:52:00 am

In spring , as the strawbery patch started to grow , I turned the geese out on them . As the blooms formed took the geese off . Best weeders I ever had .

Title: Re: You can use geese to get rid of Pigeed(the thorny kind).
Post by: luvin honey on April 15, 2010, 09:10:36 pm

Quote from: suprstakr on March 30, 2010, 11:52:00 am

In spring , as the strawbery patch started to grow , I turned the geese out on them . As the blooms formed took the geese off . Best weeders I ever had .

And they only eat the weeds? Not the plants? I've heard of weeder geese but can't think of why they would differentiate between weeds and plants...