Cheatgrass, revisited (eternally)

It is still about Trump voters (allegorically).

It is May and I am already thinking about cheatgrass. This is a good sign. I am getting better at this. When I wrote here about cheatgrass two years ago, it was June and I was just catching on.

Today is getting above 60 degrees Fahrenheit, so I shouldered a backpack sprayer and headed out to the strip the cheatgrass is growing. Sixty degrees is the temperature that the weed killer does its business.

I have been passing that row every few days, looking for what I think a baby cheatgrass would look like. I know that this blanket of spring green that I see, the short-lived photosynthesis of desert grasses, includes the invader.

I know that what I should have done is put a pre-emergent spray on the weeds in the fall to kill the seeds as they embed in the soil. Two autumns ago I didn’t do it because spraying is bad. After a year watching the cheatgrass spread, I didn’t do it last fall because I just didn’t have the money.

This spring I am spraying with a vinegar solution, to kill the young plants. With vinegar, don’t have to worry about the dogs getting in to it nor feel guilty about contributing to the collapse of plant pollinators.

But there is Roundup in my garage and I will be using it this year.

This is my fourth summer here. Every year the cheatgrass has gotten worse. For certain, the routes my dogs have dug in the soil crust has encouraged it. Also, my attempts of a couple years of a rookie chemical-free management has allowed the vile weed to expand its range.

In my post two years ago, I talked of using the heat of the sun to kill the cheatgrass seeds. An expert resident of my neighborhood, 80 years old and running a tractor at the limb dump, patiently explained that this internet theory is nonsense.

“I tried that. At the bottom of my pile was a nice scattering of fertile cheatgrass seeds. Its fire or nothing for these bastards.” I will be bagging and taking all my cheatgrass to the limb dump, where they all get burnt up in midwinter.

I will still be pulling up cheatgrass this year, but I hope to kill off some before it gets to that. It is a lot of hours of somewhat useless work; you pull up the plant, the seeds fall into the loosened soil where the roots once were, and next year you are back in the same place cursing at the same damn plant.

I am learning. I have learned to think about the cheatgrass earlier. I learned the phone number of a local guy who will spray this thing called a pre-emergent on your land in autumn. I am learning from my neighbors that the previous owner of this land, although she hated to use cling wrap because of the environmental impact, put a lot of chemicals down to keep the place free of the noxious and invasive. She is a thoughtful person and I expect it was with some consideration.

So this year, I am a little better. I know how much time the cheat grass is going to take from me. I seek to shrink its population for 2027. I am spraying to do so, because in our lives we are always balancing opposing goods.

My neighbors may judge me for the cheatgrass this year, but I appreciate their patience. We all need patience as we wrestle with hard decisions.

On Sunday’s Old Truck Good Coffee, our guest writer Pat Kruis shared her thoughts on how to consider the regret of some Trump voters.

Perhaps you are as a neighbor considering the weeds in my garden, expecting that I will come around and get better for caring for my land and our community.

It is May, and I am already thinking about cheatgrass. I hope that in September, I have the wherewithal to spray the pre-emergent like my more experienced neighbors do. I will feel sad about the chemicals, but realize that it is a better option than losing all of my land to cheatgrass and pulling their seeds from my dogs’ ears.

The cheatgrass-free dream.