Weeds

My late mother, Isabel, a demon gardener with a magic touch, was what Meg calls a lazy gardener. She never raked fall leaves from flowerbeds and ground covers, and they made a great free mulch over the winter and then gradually decomposed into the soil. Once in a while, a mat of wet leaves stifled something in spring, but not as often as the conventional wisdom of gardening would have you believe.

She did the same thing with weeds-- once she was sure they were weeds and not wildflowers, the definition of which is a matter largely of attitude. I mentioned to Meg in a comment to her first post that Isabel's philosophy about unidentifiable plants was, "Watch it and see what it does." If it has attractive foliage, pretty flowers, and isn't too aggressive, why not cultive it instead of yanking it, even if most people would call it a weed?

But familiar weeds -- and those maddening Norway maple seedlings -- she pulled from time to time when she was in the mood, and unless they were near going to seed, just dropped them where she pulled them. One more bit of organic matter to contribute to the soil. That won't do in a formal planting, I suppose. But if your taste, like mine and Isabel's, runs to what we euphemistically call "naturalized" gardens, crowded with mostly native plants that are allowed to spread cheek by jowel and flop prettily according to their nature, you'll never see the little bunches of nicely decomposing weeds underneath.

With what feels like unlimited space in my vegetable garden now, I'm even lazier and only pull big ugly weeds that take up lots of room and look like they're sucking up a good bit of water and nutrients. I mostly let them be, though, and trade the slightly lowered vegetable production for, once again, free mulch. Once you can get over wincing at the unruly sight of them in among your peas and tomatoes and most other large vegetable plants, you'll find it's a perfectly reasonable trade-off if your soil is in good condition and your plants are getting the sun and water they need.

Heresy!