"Cat(h)" wrote in message
oups.com...



Many thanks, Alan and all who commented. I think there is little point
in buying the small "flame thrower". I am reluctant to use chemicals a
few times a year - I used two packs of Pathclear a few week ends ago,
each pack costing ? - Euro - 29 (no doubt, typical Irish excessive
price). I may need to do this three times a year - allowing for not
much growth in winter - the product labelling states it lasts 3 months,
and it is quite good and effective during the growing season. By my
reckoning, that would cost me a total of ? - Euro - 174 per year.
The alternatives to this are 1) hand pulling - I have done this this
spring and summer, qutie successfully, but if I miss a week end , it
goes mad quite quickly. And I have a lot of non-gardening things to do
at week ends.
or 2) a flame thrower with more power than the Weed Wizard. Even if it
doesn't completely kill the weeds, I imagine that using it every couple
of weeks would be faster than hand pulling, and might keep the drive
clear. Bearing in mind that not all hand pulling takes out roots, and
that new weeds keep coming anyway.

Option 2) sounds sensible to me having listened to all the advice, so
I'll investigate that avenue.

Thanks again, and my humblest apologies for unwittingly unleashing an
off-topic currency symbol debate. Though anything which contributes to
a bit of Microsoft bashing can't be totally evil.

Cat(h)
Herds twirl slow...

Although I agree that the flamethrower things are not that good at killing
the roots of weeds they do a good job of killing seeds and seedlings. From
your description it appears that seeds are the problem.