I going to expand my garden and my veggies area another 400sqm. this
new piece of land has been left to nature and it has a wild flowers,
weeds and a few vines and rumbles... and it is hard like hell. I am
thinking on use some roundup and then use a rotovator... question is
should I first use the weedkiller and then rotovate or the other way
around? can the dead weeds stay in the ground and destroyed by the
rotovator?

any alternative to roundup?

thanks

Several points...

1. I was told that Roundup is the brand name for Glyphosate. It is now no
longer under patent protection so it is generally cheaper to buy the generic
Glyphosate rather than Roundup.

2. You should apply Glyphosate before rotovating because rotovating will
simply chop up and spread certain roots around compounding the weed problem.
A few weeks after rotovating you may need to apply glyphosate again because
rotovating can bring lots of weed seeds to the surface which can then
germinate - I've had this problem myself and acquired a stunning green
blanket of weed seedlings a few weeks after rotovating.

3. It is getting a bit late in the season now. Glyphosate may not be quite
so effective. I think it works by over plant growth somehow which kills the
plants, however this is best done when weeds are growing vigorously anyway.

4. If you have any brambles, dig them and their roots up - glyphosate simply
makes brambles look poorly for a week or two then they recover -
alternatively use a weedkiller specific to brambles.

So in short you may need to make several passes with the soil weedkiller -
rotovator - weedkiller - rotovator etc to make the ground suitable for
gardening and free of weeds. If it is heavy clay you may need to also apply
lime and manure, but not at the same time.

--
David
.... Email address on website http://www.avisoft.co.uk
.... Blog at http://dlts-french-adventures.blogspot.com/