Please help me KILL my cilantro

[reptileguy112]

I just figured out what has been my gardens worst weed for the 4 years I have lived in my house.I have noticed that it looked like what it is and I did some research and yes the evil weed is CILANTRO!!!!It grows everywhere from the rocks on the side of my house, to the african iris and vegetable beds on the other side of the house, to my main flower/fruit tree areas and it NEVER STOPS GROWING BACK!I even did a test to make sure I wasn't just not seeing the big ones right in sight by finding a seedling and checking on it a week later and what do you know it already bolted and has seedlings of its own.I wasn't missing them they were just growing so fast!I need YOUR held to battle against this raid of soap-lantro (if you have tasted it you know what that means) and WIN! Oh, and just for fun guess how many fruit trees I have! Hint:It not only like 2-3 and its not an amount thats huge like 20.

[applestar]

Haha I know exactly what you mean. I don't start them from seeds any more because I can usually find a nice lush patch somewhere in my garden that I haven't hoed down.

Just treat as weed, mow them down and trample them. Cilantro greens make excellent nutrient-rich mulch and compost pile ingredient.

Also, letting the cilantro bolt and flower attracts beneficial insects. So save some for that purpose too. it's not all bad.

[JosephsGarden]

reptileguy112: Perhaps you need to get out more... Out into the garden more routinely to do more weeding. Cilantro is a small plant with a delicate root system and tender stems. It dies easily when disturbed... The time between when the cilantro flowers and the seeds become viable is measured in weeks, not hours. There is plenty of time between the two to pull out any flowering cilantro that you see.

Cilantro is not magical. It's like every other annual weed. It emerges as an extremely tiny plant that could be killed the by the slightest touch of a cultivator tool. It grows larger for weeks or months until it flowers. Weeks later the seeds become viable. There is no perennial root to cause re-emergence. The flowers are conspicuous. Pull every plant when it starts flowering and the seed bank will disappear and new plants will eventually stop growing. But that requires getting out into the garden more and doing more weeding while there. Tough to do when it has taken over the whole place. Perhaps give a kid $10 per week to keep the place free of cilantro flowers. If you are trying to get rid of it you can't leave any to flower for the bees, regardless of how much they love it.

[valley]

Kill it? Pull it up and eat it!

Richard

[imafan26]

I should have your problem. I never seem to have cilantro when I need it and too much when I don't.

I should talk, arugula and pak choi are starting to reseed everywhere. Now, I know enough people to come get the pak choi, but arugula doesn't have many takers.

[grrlgeek]

Sorry reptileguy112, I am in the camp of wishing I had your problem. I even planted a "good bug blend" of seeds around the wall lines and on my back hill that includes cilantro and I hope to get a bunch of it reseeding like crazy. So many uses... Right now I have visions of your yard and gallon jugs of coriander chutney floating around the image.

But I do know people who think it tastes like soap... even those who adore epazote, which to others, tastes like gasoline. If it's green and not where you want it to be, pull it and compost it to feed those 14 fruit trees you have. (am I close on the guess?)

Happy weeding!

[reptileguy112]

JosephsGarden...the problem is that I am a kid, well actualy a teen at 13 years old.I know what your thinking, these arent my plants they're my parents...NOPE!I bought every plant and grew them my self (except for the cilantro..Duh).My parents actualy don't like me having so many plants and pets.My room has plants from white butterfly vines, to prayer plants all the way to dizygothicas.I also have a 40g freshwater fish tank in my room (I will eventualy turn it brackish) and a parrot.I actualy am starting my first "home-made" bonsai today and I just finished raising its roots and I'm going to try to figure out how to shape its stems with wires.I hope me being 13 does not change how the people on this forum think of me and I actually have a habit of getting along with adults rather than the other kids.okay, lets get back to this cilantro question, is there a home-made solution I can make for the side of the house with the vegetable garden because their isn't a problem with keeping the cilantro out of the garden its self because its a raised garden bed but other than that where it is supposed to be just rocks it is literally a lawn of cilantro.Honestly I try to stomp the cilantro in my path whenever I water of tend to my garden but they are surviving.Is there some sort of homemade liquid solution I can put in a spray bottle to spray them with.It doesn't need to just kill the cilantro, I would actually prefer it kill any plants at all because I will just spray it where the rock are supposed to be so it kills any plants in the rocks.

[applestar]

OK -- there are several home made solutions I can think of, but before I mention them, I want you to think about this: anything that kills the cilantro could kill other plants. You said that's OK, but do you know what other plants are growing there?

Many spray able liquid that kills plants could leave a residue or concentrate on evaporation that will continue to kill or stunt plant growth. Just because ingredients are "natural" or home made doesn't make it any less cumulative or harmful.

It's also a good idea to consider what besides plants live there or visit -- birds? animals? Insects? Micro-organisms? -- and what effect the spraying will have on them.

What if in the future you or someone else wants to use the area for some other purpose?

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Hand weeding is often most effective after a heavy saturating rain or after the area has even watered. Roots pull out very easily. Hand weeding is also very effective in the middle of a drought because any weeds pulled will turn limp and die quickly.

Do consider what we said earlier -- do you have a compost pile or vermicompost going? Free compost ingredient and wormfood is nothing to scoff at. Either would be an excellent addition to your menagerie. Both nurture micro-organisms and soil conditioners that adds fertility and are beneficial to plant growth and health. Mulching is a very important and effective growing technique.

If hand pulling is not an option because there are too many cilantro, another option is to smother them in situ. Flattened cardboard box for example. What kind of "rocks" ? Is this an uneven terrain?

[JosephsGarden]

reptileguy112: Way cool. My first job for money was pulling weeds for an old lady. I suppose that I started when I was about ten. I pulled weeds once a week during the summer until she died. That's some fond memories. And I'm still weeding, although these days I tend to use a hoe so that I don't have to bend over. Maybe one of these days I'll have to hire a young kid to weed for me.

I hear that vinegar is a good weed killer that doesn't persist in the environment. I've never tried it though.

[reptileguy112]

I wouldn't put compost over the rock area because it is supposed to just be rocks there.The only things the live in the rock area are weeds, cilantro, and the occasional ant hill that sometimes gets ants in the house.The only desirable life that actually grows in the rocks is a few naked lily bulbs that got buried in the rocks down to dirt level that I'm moving anyways.There is no future plans to do anything the the side of the house because its a small sliver and it is completely rock (except for the 2-3 raised beds). I already add used coffee grinds to my gardens & I have at least 70 worms in each of the raised beds.I started to do a composed before but it has to much gross odor, attraction to bugs, and "dedication" (?) for my parents to to let me do it.

grrlgeek-Good guess, I have 13 (if you include a money tree that bears fruit.

[reptileguy112]

Josephsgarden-I am not in need of money in fact a couple years ago I funded a trip to Iowa for me and my brother to go see my family (and no it wasn't allowance, I don't get allowance).I will have to consider getting a hoe.I think it would use way to much vinegar to not be cost effective.I would prefer something to definitely kill any plants.

[grrlgeek]

I will have to consider getting a hoe.I think it would use way to much vinegar to not be cost effective.I would prefer something to definitely kill any plants.

A hoe is a little tough to use in rocks unless they're small, like pea gravel, because then you can push the rocks around to drag the weeds out of the soil. I've never had any success with the big taproot stuff we get here in the desert though. When you start getting into larger rocks, stones, boulders, river rock stuff, the hoe is a lot of work and not that effective, at least in my experience. So in our rock garden, we weed by hand. Big stuff first, then plucking here and there whenever we're out there to keep it manageable, then right after the last spring rain, we bite the bullet and spend several hours pulling every weed by hand. Wet ground makes easy plucking. If it's green, and I didn't put it there, it goes. Then we starve them. The plants in the garden get targeted drip and nothing else gets a drop of water. We didn't put plastic or any barrier down either. The spring rain brings some weeds, we get rid of them, then it's free sailing until the following year. If nothing else is supposed to grow there, then you can make an afternoon of it, pull them all from the root (a large flat blade screwdriver is a handy tool for dislodging taproots). The suggestion to smother with cardboard until they all die is also something that would definitely kill all (or at least most) plants.

Then, cap any irrigation that keeps giving the seeds a chance to germinate. If it rains, pluck early at the first sight of any green.

Your other solution that will definitely kill any plants is a chemical one. It can be short term, or long term, but if these rocks are uphill from, or in the vicinity of, your garden, the chemicals will likely leach into the soil below your raised beds and kill all plants there. A spray that will kill a weed, will also kill a tomato plant.

The answer you seek isn't the answer you want.... but pulling the plants out by hand, in what sounds like a relatively small area, isn't as bad as it sounds. We weed a 300sf rock garden exposed to desert winds that blow in off a field in a couple of hours. That's mostly all gnarly aggressive taproot type weeds and little teeny tiny creeper groundcover plantlets that are everywhere! Cilantro would be a walk in the park. And you could make chutney!

Good luck, and enjoy your 13 trees!

[applestar]

I said use cardboard to smother cilantro or other weeds -- not put compost over the rocks... But did you decide what to do?

Another simple and safe -- to an extent -- "weed killer" is hot water.

I have an unmortared brick patio outside the kitchen/back door and occasional ant invasion somewhere around the back door frame. When I cook pasta, I don't put salt in the water, and, after scooping out the pasta, pour the hot pasta cooking water over the weeds and anthills near the back door.

If you decide to do this, be careful you don't burn yourself.

If I don't use the pasta cooking water as weed killer, I let it cool and pour over the compost pile -- waste not.

[Juliuskitty]

Nice problem to have IMHO. People here will pay $3.50 for a 6" pot of the stuff growing.

[reptileguy112]

Sorry I haven't replied for awhile.I will use hot water and cardboard.Thanx 4 the help!

[evtubbergh]

Where do you live?! I wish I could have just some - mine just dies

@apple I totally agree - I try to keep all cooking water, rinsing water, water baths, everything I can really and pour on the compost.

[ambersvictorygarden]

Sorry you're overrun with something you don't want. I have a problem with mint...I love it, but it chokes out everything around it. I'm glad to hear that cilantro reseeds so readily in the garden. I LOVE cilantro and I never have enough. I'm going to go plant it in my raised beds and hope it spreads...I recently read that you can be born with a gene that makes cilantro taste like soap. Sounds crazy but I feel like it must be true. I think it tastes like HEAVEN

[JC's Garden]

I have just the opposite problem. My wife uses a lot of it, she's a personal chef. What excess I do have is sold at our local organic co-op. I never have enough to satisfy demand.

[rainbowgardener]

My cilantro is doing great this year:



The tall thing coming up out of the fencing is one cilantro plant. I have several of them scattered around. I'm one of the people for whom it tastes like soap, but I'm hoping for coriander seed. If you click on the picture, you can see it is covered in flowers.

I wonder if there's a connection? I'm also a PTC taster. For some people like me PTC (phenylthiocarbamide) tastes very bitter, for others it is tasteless.

[imafan26]

Too bad you probably don't know a few people who love cilantro, you could just have them over and let them go at it, preferably before it goes to seed.