Stopping red clover in my ice plants

[mcaquatic]

HI
I have some really large and nice ice plants (Delosperma) growing along my walk. I feel like I am at war with the red clover and some of the other weeds. How do I stop the red clover from growing through them? I try to pull the clover out but it is near impossible. Also kind of miserable on some of these really hot days. Thank you

[applestar]

Those are actually not clover but Yellow Wood Sorrel. They are tough to pull as you noticed, with firmly entrenched roots. They are also drought tolerant and worse, when they are allowed to go to seed, the seed capsules POP and scatter the seeds.

They are actually FUN for little kids to play with....

They are easier to pull out when the soil is saturated -- so weed after good soaking rain or after irrigating. IF hot and miserable is the issue, you could weed in rain or with the sprinker running....

Trace the wiry stems back to the base -- they tend to break off so you need a firm grip -- wearing leather fingered or kitchen gloves helps a bit --pull steadily until the entire or at least most of the root system pulls out of the ground.

If your other plants are planted in any kind of a pattern with wide spacing, then you can just put down several layers of paper over the wood sorrel. The wood sorrel leaves are delicate and will smother easily.

[mcaquatic]

Hi thank you for the reply and the identification. Are there any chemical options to killing it without killing my plants. They are so intertwined that pulling them out is near impossible. This is why I am loosing the battle

[ButterflyLady29]

Anything that would kill the sorrel would also kill the ice plant. The best advice I can give is to dig out the ice plant or take cuttings from it and start new plants. Once you have the plants you want, dig the whole area and replant with the ice plant.

[applestar]

Herbicides won't be able to distinguish between the two. This is going to be difficult because wood sorrel is a pretty tough weed.

Off the top of my head, I would try two ways to differentiate between the two
(1) visual check -- wood sorrel leaves will fold up under some conditions -- can't remember if its when dark, when wet, or when too hot.
(2) by feel -- wood sorrel stems are thin and wiry and leaves a super thin and flat... Very different from ice plant Find a stem and then follow it to the base of the plant.

Try pulling them out when the soil is wet as mentioned above.

...or try the opposite -- just pull the leaves off to weaken the weeds -- this should also help to strengthen the ice plant because right now the weeds are taking all the sun.

...

How established are your ice plants. If well established, and they are more deep-rooted and drought tolerant than the wood sorrel, you might be able to force the wood sorrel into dormancy (don't think they will die....) by withholdings water.

...

At the very least, if you can sufficiently disrupt them, by cutting the wood sorrel stems you might be able to get the ice plant to gain dominance over them.

[mcaquatic]

thank you. this is my ice plants second season. Looks like I will be going back to plucking them.

[applestar]

I had a thought -- wood sorrel prefers acidic soil -- it's actually one of the weeds that can be used as soil pH indicator -- but ice plant can take alkaline soil. You could try applying lime to raise the soil pH.

[mcaquatic]

HI This sounds interesting. Sorry I am a real Noob for gardening. How do I go about doing this? thanks you

[applestar]

I prefer Dolomitic Lime in pelleted form -- it contains magnesium as well as other trace minerals but is not caustic like some other forms of lime. But I'm not very scientific about it. Some people would recommend having your soil tested first.

My very casual method would be to just scatter a handful and scratch in or simply shake off if any on foliage (do this when foliage is dry) or if any sticks to foliage, rinse off with water from the hose.

[mcaquatic]

thank you

[mcaquatic]

I am loosing this battle badly and some of my nicest plants are getting choked out. I put down the lime pellets and have seen no difference. I think part of the problem is I don't know my soil pH before or after.
Ice plants are considered fairly salt tolerant. If I started watering these guys with salt water anyone know off hand or how I can look up what salinity woodsorrel can tolerate up to?

[ButterflyLady29]

Lime takes time to work. And even more time before the plants start to suffer. Salt would perform the same way. Any amount large enough to kill the sorrel quickly would also kill the ice plants.

[mcaquatic]

HI everyone so the Yellow Wood Sorrel is getting the best of me. I thought I would use winter to knock it back and try to pull out all the dead vines in the spring but with our mild winter it is already coming back. I really like my ice plants but right now it is a lost cause. If was to dig the whole area up and re do it as more of a rock garden for the ice plants. Having a sand base and gravel top would this stop the Yellow Wood Sorrel and many of our local weeds from growing?

[applestar]

I think if you were to use lime-based gravel, marble chips, etc. your rock garden would naturally more alkaline and may deter the wood sorrel.

Weed seeds will still fall in crevices of the gravel and sand, but because they need to grow long toots to seek moisture, it IS EASIER to pull out. The way to get at the wood sorrel is to follow the younger, thinner stems to the mother plant and get rid of THAT. Also be persistent NOW, before they start to bloom and scatter seeds.

Actually this is true if ANY weed -- go at them earlier and be as thorough as you can before they start growing in earnest, definitely get rid of them (even if just randomly ripping them out and leaving roots behind) before or as soon as they start blooming.

Wood sorrel leaves are so tender if you could just crush them, that would be enough to slow them down. You could even paint them with vegetable oil, though I wouldn't go spraying oil around.

If you have wood sorrel there, you probably have sheep sorrel as well? They are sturdier and can be more difficult.

What is the ice plant doing now? Is it easier to get at the weeds?

...what happened to papering and mulching/smothering -- was not a viable idea between ice plants, where it's just the weeds and not growing among the ice plants?

[john gault]

Speaking of Wood Sorrel...I have two types the yellow and the pink, both are edible, but the pink variety has larger leaves and much more taste, here's a video of that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqxZhbIzUlI

BTW, I eat the flowers, because the taste is very concentrated and great in salads.

[mcaquatic]

hi thank you for the input the. the problem is that the sorrel growths through the ice plants not so much between. SO its so interwoven with the plant and there is already so much of the sorrel that would take hours of miserable work to try to get it out.

I guess I could try the olive oil but to do that I would have to get the ice plant as well.

The ice plants the sorrel did not kill seems to be handling the winter ok but the new and old sorrel growth is so tangled in it.

pretty much of all the sorrel starts in the ice plants and works it way out

if I am going to spend hours working on it I figure its just better to rip the areas up and start them off right

[rainbowgardener]

I agree. It was suggested earlier in this thread that you dig out the ice plants, set them aside then hoe/till/turn/weed out the area, do the best you can to get rid of all the weeds, then replant. For noxious weeds that spread from the roots/ by runners and if you are dealing with a relatively small area, it has been suggested that you just dig out all the soil, maybe a foot deep or however much is possible. Put all the soil through a sifter/ screen. That sorts out all the pieces of root, etc and should give you soil that is very clean and loosened up. Then put the soil back and replant the ice plants (making SURE you don't put any pieces of weed root back in with them -- maybe soak the ice plants in a bucket of water while you are doing the other stuff, to clean the weed pieces off them).

[mcaquatic]

I agree. It was suggested earlier in this thread that you dig out the ice plants, set them aside then hoe/till/turn/weed out the area, do the best you can to get rid of all the weeds, then replant. For noxious weeds that spread from the roots/ by runners and if you are dealing with a relatively small area, it has been suggested that you just dig out all the soil, maybe a foot deep or however much is possible. Put all the soil through a sifter/ screen. That sorts out all the pieces of root, etc and should give you soil that is very clean and loosened up. Then put the soil back and replant the ice plants (making SURE you don't put any pieces of weed root back in with them -- maybe soak the ice plants in a bucket of water while you are doing the other stuff, to clean the weed pieces off them).

thank you. its two big areas ( maybe 20 ft x 3 ft). if I am digging them up any how wouldn't it be worth changing the soil to something the sorrel would not readily survive in? If I am planting right back into the soil can't the plant easily be propagated again by seeds blowing in?
Does anyone know if changing to sand/gravel and using alkalinity would this stop the sorrel?

Also it is not possible to dig out the plant without the sorrel. It is all intertwined. So my plan was to break it up into sections and plant the sections.

If I attempt brushing oil onto the leaves. Doing this I will definitely get some onto the plant but can try to limit it. How does the oil kill the plant? How damaging will it be to the ice plant?