[moab]

How about not killing the weeds? One doesn't need to live a perfectly manicured pesticide-ridden hellscape.

[derriz]

Or if you do want a manicured plot, just cut them with a lawnmower?

The bane of my young life was having the job of cutting the grass around the house - we lived in the country at the time and had about 1/2 an acre of lawn as well as fruit trees, plants, vegetables, etc.

We never considered using weedkiller - I just can't see the need. Isn't it just as easy to pull the weed out of the ground as it is to spray round-up on it and wait for it to die, before presumably anyway pulling the remains of it?

Ignoring the health implications completely, I can see some "value" of using round-up in a commercial environment where your dealing with 100s of acres or more but fail to see what benefit it provides in a domestic setting when the number of weeds is small enough that it would just takes minutes to remove them physically and toss them into a compost heap.

[mrgoldenbrown]

Digging weeds and their roots up one by one by hand out of cracks in concrete/asphalt is much slower than spraying. Also much more physically challenging, which is a metric I didn't care about when young and able bodies but nowadays is very relevant to me. I'm not saying roundup is good, but there are plenty of reasons for it to be appealing. I haven't tried the boiling water method yet, it seems like it'd be easier than digging but harder than spraying, unless perhaps one has a mobile, outdoor source of boiling water.

[Retric]

I rarely use weed killer on poison ivy to avoid coming into physical contact. Lawnmowers work fine for flat yards, but for steps down a steep embankment you really need a weed eater and weed eater + poison ivy is a major hassle.

[analog31]

In my area, some weeds will absolutely take over and choke out everything else while also spreading throughout the neighborhood to the delight of all.

But roundup isnt much of an option when the weeds are next to the nice stuff. My compromise is to pull the weeds when I'm motivated to and call it a day.

[TitaRusell]

This is how humans had to do it for millennia- by hand. Backbreaking work. But necessary unless you wanted to lose half the harvest.

I dislike gardening and enjoy my apartment!

[delichon]

I live in an extremely high wildfire risk area. I also have an extreme rodent problem. Keeping the vegetation low around structures is indicated.

[triceratops]

Keeping vegetation low is a different problem from removing weeds in a targeted fashion. A simple mower or trimmer should suffice.

[moab]

You can do that by mowing, fyi.

[jhide]

I agree about with your claim, but the answer to your question is that “weeds” is a set of species that contains both invasive, ecologically harmful species, and crucial native annual and perennial forbs+grasses.

From the universalizability principle, if everyone merely let “weeds” propagate, because of the ecology of invasives that are in that set, we would be MUCH worse off for the next few millennia than we are now. Until the ecosystems healed and the “invasives” become “keystone species”. Not sure how long that would take but we won’t see it :)

[Zach_the_Lizard]

Some weeds are quite unpleasant, such as sticker burrs. I'd rather not have a dog and children covered in those.

Some weeds can be damaging to property, trees, sidewalks, etc. or are poisonous.

It's not always about being annoyed by dandelions in an otherwise overly fussed over sterile lawn environment.

[onli]

Even then, spraying cancer causing chemicals into the land is beyond stupid. Killing yourself and the humans around your land for having a bit less work, one can't be more antisocial.

[malfist]

Pesticides aren't used to kill weeds.

Herbicides are useful, they certainly help prevent invasive weed species from taking over native plants and grasses. I'm Kentucky I'm always fighting Johnson grass, thistle and Japanese knotweed in my bluegrass

[Angostura]

Pesticide is a catch-all term that encompasses herbicides, insecticides, fungicides etc.

[GaryBluto]

How about letting him do what he wants with his own land and not insulting his ideal home?

[oftenwrong]

What if I want to do something on my land that will poison the ground water for the area? What if I want to raise an invasive species on my land that will likely escape and devastate local wildlife? Should society be permissive and wait for the damage to be done before stopping me, instead of being proactive and stopping me from doing so before the fact?

[moab]

You're entitled to your own opinion, but imo the point of posting anything on HN is to subject yourself to feedback. That's what I gave. Feedback.

[striking]

Their comment asked for an alternative.

[snapdeficit]

How about thinking about society and not just every man for himself? Clearly you didn’t read TFA.

[stubish]

Fire hazard and native wildlife, mostly. Over here, anything called a weed is invasive. Native birds and insects like their native species, and invasive vegetation brings in invasive species.

[hermitcrab]

We don't mow one part of our lawn and have sowed it with wildflowers) which some people might call weeds) to attract insects. Some wildflowers prefer poor soil, so my wife scythes it at the end of the season and removes all the cuttings. I'm hoping we might get some native orchids eventually.

[mvdtnz]

Sorry you think my Japanese garden is a hellscape.

[psunavy03]

Why is something someone else enjoys a "pesticide-ridden hellscape?"

How would you like me to come and pompously shit all over something you enjoy?