Can anyone help me please, since the recent rains the b****t weeds have sprung up like crazy. I was about to get out my trusty sprayer and realised that I haven't seen any Spanish neighbours out spraying yet. I wondered if now was the time as well as spring or am I missing something?

I have one neighbor spraying, another has just rotovated them all into the ground,

Now is the time to spray - or, better still, rotovate whilst the soil is loose and not too wet.

Thanks as always, for prompt and helpful replies

Is this a garden/ allotment you're talking about?
The one bad thing about weeds is that they deprive your sown/planted crops of nutrients & potentially harbour disease.
However, if you're talking about a piece of ground that was bare 'fallow', possibly destined for cropping in the spring, then weeds can give green cover, which helps prevent loss of Nitrogen through the soil.
As long as the weeds do not go to seed, then there's nothing wrong, apart from the fact that they might annoy you by their presence!!
The ones I always try to get rid of are the "twitch" variety which have underground runners (rhizomes), & whose green shoots look like grass.

If need be, sow in autumn a "green manure" crop such as mustard, or even alfalfa, the latter being a legume, so it creates nitrogen in its roots. Then dig it all in before you plant your crops.

Where is Campo near Competa?

I have just bought some green manure seeds to try to do this in some of my fallow beds but we went down to 3 degrees last night do you think it is too late to sew them?

I wouldn't have thought so. Unless you're really high up, say in the Pyrenees, where there might be snow or frost, it should be fine. It's surprising what most crops can withstand, all things considered.
Green manure seed will need tending just like any other, ie don't let it dry out until germination. With mustard seed, merely scattering it over the surface, raking the soil over it slighlty & lightly firming it in the seed bed (eg with the upturned rake) should do the trick.

As you may be aware, green manure should be cut & dug in before it starts flowering, otherwise you may get "weed volunteers" growing when you least want them.

Hope that helps.

great thanks

Can anyone tell me what they use to spray weeds?

thanks

we go to the local agrosum, they advise us as you can get different ones for using around certain trees or even some that do not kill certain plants, there seems to be different strenghs from the fairly light duty like weedol to the high strengh that they put in the large tractor sprayers, be careful I am sure that some of them are very toxic, once a year the tractor man wears a load of protective clothing including mask! However we aim to only spray this one type of weed that grows into viscous spiky trees so we just spray these once a year not the whole area. The rest we pull up, hoe, let the chickens loose on or rotovate.

That's a straightforward question that isn't easy to answer likewise!

A chemical that kills all plants via the roots (including plants you want) is 'roundup', probably sold in garden centres as weedol or similar. It was developed by Monsanto, but their patent ran out years ago. The chemical is known as glyphosate. So it's good if you have ONLY weeds to kill.

Another one that kills green leaf (again including your good plants) is a chemical known as Paraquat.

You have to read the small print to find the chemical name!

Other chemicals can be used that are "selective" ie ones that kill weeds but not the friendly plant you want. They'll be more expensive. For those, you'll need advice.

Personally, with my allotment I never use chemicals, other than slug pellets. Prefer to combat weeds mechanically, ie digging over the ground, then repeat that a few weeks later till you weaken the little b-----s that they give up. Or pull them up in between the good plants.

Hope that answers some of your question.

Apparently. like most things in Spain, you have to have attended a course and be licensed by the town hall to use any sort of weed spraying equipment (even in your own garden) or face a fine of up to 3000 euros if not licensed, I kid you not !!!