If you till it, they will come

We're talking about crabgrass.  The relationship of plants to their soil, and the relationship of the local ecology to your garden is a fascinating thing.  When ground is disturbed by removing the existing plant material and digging or tilling up the soil, there is a specific order in which a variety of species will sprout, grow, mature, and then be overtaken by another species.  This is called natural succession.  Successional growth has been mapped out for the different areas of Georgia, and the first thing that will grow on disturbed ground is crabgrass.  It is guaranteed.  If you dig up a sunny spot and leave it, you will get a substantial cover of crabgrass with a few other things mixed in. 

Weeding is one of my least favorite gardening chores, yet it has to be done on a weekly basis to keep the invasives from stealing sun, water, and soil nutrients from your garden plants.  The job is much easier if you get at them while they're young - so be vigilant. 

Pulling weeds is one of those chores that you might begin to do while you're just out walking your garden - you might not be planning on working that hard as you stoop down to pull a few, and then notice a few more, and then a patch over here... you start to get vindictive, you get this crazy look in your eyes, and then it becomes addictive.  Before you know it you'll be down on the ground in your clothes that weren't meant to get dirty with a whole lot of soil under your fingernails!  Sometimes it helps to have a spouse around who can forcibly lay their hands on you,  hold you back, and talk sense into you. 

Sometimes the sense that needs to be talked involves the procurement of a good hoe.  Hoeing doesn't involve stooping and for the most part keeps your fingernails clean, but you might want to invest in some light gloves or be okay with some minor blisters that will soon callous over.  

Spraying weeds?  It can be done.  I won't discuss it here.  Besides, if you go and do that there is the likelihood of it drifting onto your veggie plants and that's just no good. 

As with anything else, prevention is great: mulch your garden.  If you have raked leaves leftover from last fall, those will work great.  Grass clippings work great too but be aware that they will still contain any chemicals that may have sprayed on your lawn and they are also likely to include some weed seeds.  Purchased hay is good but can also contain seeds; pine straw will contain less seeds; wood chips work fine but make sure they have been aged a few months so they won't steal nitrogen from your garden soil during their early decay process.  If you have a continuous supply of compost, that will make a great mulch as it will build up your soil.   Weeds will grow in compost better than these other mulching materials, so you'll likely still be doing more weeding if you make this choice.  Newspaper makes decent weed prevention as well, but if slugs are causing trouble in your garden you might want to skip it as slugs can hide and multiply under a thick cover of paper. 

Additionally, if your method of irrigating your garden allows you to water your plants only and  not the space in between plants, you'll reduce the amount of weeds that germinate.