Will This Natural Formula Work on Western Colorado Weeds?

Anytime you mention Colorado and weed in the same sentence, the mind takes off in a certain direction. In this case, I'm talking about good old weeds, the unwanted vegetation that grows in your yard. You've undoubtedly encountered a formula for "homemade" weedkiller floating around the Internet. Does it really work in our climate?

My yard is already showing signs of weeds. Here it is, only March 23. With today's heavy rain, it's a fair bet that a healthy crop of weeds will overtake my yard before you know it.

The popular mixture of vinegar, dish soap, and salt, is regarded by many on the Internet as a miracle. The gallery above shows several shots, embarrassing shots, of my backyard last year. Despite what it looks like, I do occasionally do a little yard work. Unfortunately, last spring, weeds got a little out of control.

The shots show a patch of various weeds in my yard. This area receives direct sunlight from the start of the day to the end. These weeds were sprayed with a homemade mixture of the following components:

• vinegar
• Dawn blue dish washing soap
• salt

The area was sprayed with a household pump sprayer on two occasions, each a week apart. Cost of the mixture, about 50 cents. These photos were taken a week after the second spraying. As you can see, not much has happened.

After a week long break, the area was sprayed again, this time using a residential quality weed spray purchased from a local home improvement store. Cost for this product: about $13. The mix was applied using the exact same weed sprayer.

The photos below were taken 96 hours after the application of the purchased weed spray product. As you can see, there is a noticeable difference.

Let me assure you, I'm not receiving kickbacks from the Round Up corporation. Secondly, I am aware the purchased weed spray was applied to weeds that had already been hit twice by the homemade mix. After three applications of spray, it's not hard to understand why the weeds would eventually throw in the towel and give up.

When it is all said and done, it seems as though the homemade mixture really didn't work as well as the Internet would have you believe. There were some results, but only marginal, and that was after two weeks and two applications. Granted, I probably mixed the ingredients a little too conservatively.

There very well might be something to be said for the homemade mixture. Maybe I didn't get the proportions correct. In any event, for whatever reason, the homemade mix did not seem to produce the rapid results shown by the purchased product. I would like to give it another try in 2018. I dislike the idea of spraying commercial chemicals all over the place, though. Give it a shot yourself, and see if you experience the same results.