Garden identifier: weed seedlings

If you can, make room in your garden for an uncultivated patch where weeds can grow freely. Choose a tucked-away spot so you can focus your energy on the more visible areas of the garden. Boost the biodiversity in these areas by creating dead wood habitats or a stumpery for insects.

More weed-busting advice:

• Weeding without chemicals
• How to weed a wildflower patch (video)
• Can I eradicate horsetail? (video)
• Five ways to eradicate weeds
• Removing Japanese knotweed

Use our handy guide to weed seedlings to identify unwanted arrivals.

Dandelion, Taraxacum officinale

Spot it: identify this widespread weed by the distinctive rosettes of leaves with deep tap roots. Spreads rapidly by seeds after flowering.

Solution: dig out the entire taproot and don't let it set seed.

Bramble, Rubus fruticosus

Spot it: stems root into the soil to form thickets. The fruit (blackberries) also spread seed.

Solution: cut back plants when young and dig out all roots.

Speedwell, Veronica persica

Spot it: delicate looking, with small blue flowers, it seeds itself through lawns and borders.

Solution: hoe or mow it out before it can seed and spread.

Nettles, Urtica dioica

Spot it: a tough perennial with strong spreading stems and thick roots.

Solution: dig out the plants and their roots before they can get established.

Lesser celandine, Ficaria verna

Spot it: this perennial grows from persistent root tubers and has flat, heart-shaped leaves and yellow spring flowers.

Solution: dig out every single piece of root.

Hairy bittercress, Cardamine hirsuta

Spot it: short-lived, but it spreads rapidly via thousands of fast-germinating seeds.

Solution: remove plants when young, before seeds form.

Chickweed, Stellaria media

Spot it: a quick-growing annual, chickweed spreads to form dense, smothering mats.

Solution: hoe out, hand weed or smother with mulch.

Bindweed, Calystegia sepium

Spot it: a highly invasive perennial climber that will smother plants and take over beds.

Solution: remove every bit of root and plant, or it will return.

Couch grass, Elymus repens

Spot it: this vigorous perennial spreads by creeping underground stems as well as by seed.

Solution: dig it out, removing every piece of root and stem.

Sun spurge, Euphorbia helioscopia

Spot it: common annual with abundant seeds that disperse explosively.

Solution: remove when young, before plants have time to flower and set seed.

Creeping woodsorrel, Oxalis corniculata

Spot it: Oxalis is a persistent weed with clover-like foliage that spreads by means of creeping stems that root and explosive seed capsules. The species has green foliage, though a purple-leaved type is also common.

Solution: hoe repeatedly, smother with mulch or dig out all parts of the plant.

Time your weeding

It's particularly important when hoeing that you do it in the morning, on a dry day. That way weeds can be left on the surface to dry out and die before being raked up.