Question
Every year there is more liver wort in shady areas of my 1/2 sunny garden in Noe Valley. I have just scraped a lot of it off with a trowel. I plan to amend & plant some cool vegetables there. What can I do to remove it permanently?
Heather
San Francisco
Answer
Liverwort loves moisture, loves nutrient rich soil. Amending your soil with a compost should help as the top of the soil where the liverwort lives will tend to dry out faster. Avoid using liquid fertilizers in areas where liverwort thrives. You are better off, mixing in a dry fertilizer into the soil or using a preplant fertilizer such as Sure Start and incorporating a slow release such as Osmocote at the same time. Liverwort can be killed by spraying it with vinegar. Household vinegar is a 5% concentration that will work on rootless liverwort (it is not strong enough for other weeds). We also have a vinegar based herbicide called Burn Out that has a higher 6.25% concentration. As for permanent eradication, the more you are able to scrape away and dispose of BEFORE it flowers (those odd umbrella-shaped structures), the less spores you will have to hatch at later dates.
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