What to plant in forest?

[Catscratch]

That's a cool discovery. I've had similar luck against thistle with those tactics. I've even gone as far as starting to use dirty feed oats when I need something quick and I can't get certified seed. I just don't fear those super weeds any longer.

I believe you also have a similar story with a weed and gypsum. Just take away it's favored conditions and watch fade away.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

 

[SD51555]

I believe you also have a similar story with a weed and gypsum. Just take away it's favored conditions and watch fade away.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

That was field horsetail and lime. It required 4 specific conditions to run wild, and I provided them all:

*Kill all of it's competition
*Have soggy soil
*Have a lower pH
*Have excess free potassium

This is what that cocktail got me:. It was really an amazing feat. I grew such a tremendous crop of horsetail, I was able to create a crop canopy with a plant that has no leaves.



It slowly started to click when I was doing some experiments to try to stimulate acorn production in mature bur oaks. I spread a full 50 pound bag of lime under the canopy of each tree. It must have been a high dose, because you could see the exact line where the lime was spread, because the fern and horsetail vanished. This is one of many observations that led me to get rid of all my sprayers, chemicals, and fertilizers. Once I quit the potions, my problems went away.

 

[yoderjac]

I fought Palmer and marestail in my plots like crazy for a while. Gave up on Liberty Link and gly and went to an approach of out competing them with plants that enjoyed the same conditions as them, but made sure to mix seed varieties in that would take over after the initial crop wore out. My seed bank is full of those weeds from the couple of years that I lost those battles, but I never see them anymore.

That is why I like weed diversity. When I had a marestail problem, I found gly was favoring marestail over other weeds making the problem worse. LIberty helped, but I'm sure there is some noxious weed that it will favor over time. I went with specific herbicides aimed a the marestail along with a smother crop of buckwehat and sunn hemp that did not require gly. I still have marestail, but not a marestail problem. There are just a few plants because other weeds, many used by deer, that compete with them now.

 

[Catscratch]

That was field horsetail and lime. It required 4 specific conditions to run wild, and I provided them all:

*Kill all of it's competition
*Have soggy soil
*Have a lower pH
*Have excess free potassium

This is what that cocktail got me:. It was really an amazing feat. I grew such a tremendous crop of horsetail, I was able to create a crop canopy with a plant that has no leaves.

View attachment 39135

It slowly started to click when I was doing some experiments to try to stimulate acorn production in mature bur oaks. I spread a full 50 pound bag of lime under the canopy of each tree. It must have been a high dose, because you could see the exact line where the lime was spread, because the fern and horsetail vanished. This is one of many observations that led me to get rid of all my sprayers, chemicals, and fertilizers. Once I quit the potions, my problems went away.

View attachment 39136

Oh ya, that's right... it was pH based weed control. Sorry for the confusion. I remembered the point but forgot the specifics. That was a solid move to pay attention and figure out what was going on around your oaks, then to apply it to your plots.

 

[SD51555]

Oh ya, that's right... it was pH based weed control. Sorry for the confusion. I remembered the point but forgot the specifics. That was a solid move to pay attention and figure out what was going on around your oaks, then to apply it to your plots.

I've learned a lot that way since then. I am always wondering why one this is happening here, and not there.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Do you find it does better in wetter areas (Aliske)?

I've never planted Alsike in areas with puddles or standing water. It has done well in some of our clayish loam soil in shadier spots that don't drain that rapidly - but we have no bottomland type terrain. We're on high ground. We mixed Alsike with some medium red clover - not a pure stand of Alsike - but it grew well for us on newly-opened ground with no big prep.

 

[jsasker007]

Do you find it does better in wetter areas (Aliske)?

YES

 

[Derek Reese 29]

YES

I use it when initially starting a plot where I need a perennial that can handle about anything..like Bows I usually mix it with MRC and I have had that mix come in very well in sub optimal soil conditions (limed soil starting with a pH in the high 4-low 5 range)