Hunker down and let me tell you a secret.
For the best part of my life I have broken my back, my finger nails, and sometimes my heart, in the practical pursuit of gardening.
There are moments of course when I feel pleased, and others when I utterly despair. The pleased moments usually happen in spring and last up to the middle of June.
By that mid-summer time all the freshness has gone off everything and things become heavy and blown. The garden loses its adolescent look, that wonderful astonishment at its own youth. It is then that I despair for even the weeds seem to mock me.
Take for example that most troublesome of lawn weeds: white clover.
It gets a foothold during dry spells, from seed dropped by birds or blown in by the wind and it spreads at an alarming rate — if no steps are taken to control it.
White (and red) clover belongs to a very large family of plants called the Leguminosae, or pea-flowers, which comprise some 7,000 members worldwide and it includes many garden species such as lupins, cultivated peas, broom, wisteria and many others.
The leaves of this weed can be identified by a distinctive white band which runs across the leaflets. The stems root as they grow and large clumps are quickly formed.
It is a low, creeping perennial well suited to life in the lawn, often surviving below cutting height, deep within the sward.
Clover is drought, flood, lightning and cat resistant and it is certainly capable of out-living the grass during long periods of drought. Once rain does fall, the clover quickly springs to faster life, outstripping the lawn grasses and swiftly colonising bare or thin areas.
Some clovers produce prussic acid in their leaves, a chemical which if eaten in large quantities by grazing animals may cause poisoning. However the unpleasant taste often deters them.
Late as June is, now would be a particularly good month to begin control of clover and all other lawn weeds for most are coming into full active growth. For under £8 it is possible to source a ready-to-use liquid weed-killer specially formulated for control of all lawn weeds.
Sold as Doff Lawn Weed killer, this systemic and selective product (it knows the difference between grass and weeds) is very effective against clover, daisy, yarrow, thistle, sorrel, lesser trefoil, plantain, buttercup, self-heal, pearlworth, hawkbit, common knapweed and common mouse ear.
Make up the solution by adding a cap-full of concentrate and use this to treat 15 square metres of lawn.
If you add a tiny drop of washing-up liquid to the watering can or sprayer it will ensure a better ‘stick’ to the clover leaves, especially their undersides.
All other weeds can be similarly treated. Do not allow the spray to come into contact with ornamental plants.
