More and more folks are growing their own vegetables, for reasons ranging from the esoteric, like taste, to the practical, like saving money. If you want to be an urban or suburban farmer, one important thing you need to be aware of is that those soils are often contaminated with lead, arsenic, cadmium and other toxic substances. Much of it has to do with lead paints that were used until the late 1970s and proximity to auto emissions. Heavy metals also occur naturally, but rarely at toxic levels.

The good news is that fruiting vegetables like tomatoes and peppers don't take up a lot of these chemicals. The bad news is that leafy vegetables, like lettuce and spinach, and root vegetables, like carrots and radishes, do.

Here are a couple of good websites that will help you determine whether you might have a problem. The first, from Illinois Extension, also tells you where you can get your soil tested in Illinois.
asap.sustainability.uiuc.edu
www.extension.umn.edu

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Weed Killing the Earth Friendly Way
Instead of using really nasty chemicals to rid your garden of noxious weeds, where possible just try using water.

Yes, water :)

The trick is to boil it first of course. This is particularly effective for use on weeds in the expansion joints on driveways and paths. Other greener options for killing weeds (depending on the type):
1) Neat white vinegar is good as an earth friendly broad leaf weed killer. Vinegar is most effective when applied on a sunny day.
2) A strong saline (salt) solution can be used on gravel driveways and where weeds have sprung up between cracks or joins in pavers. It's probably best not to use this in open areas where other plants are close by as repeated applications can cause the salt to leach over a wider area. It's for this reason that salt is also a good way to prevent weeds from growing again.
3) Lemon juice is also said to be highly effective in killing weeds of all types and it will break down very quickly.

- Green Living Tips, greenlivingtips.com,
12 Dec, 2008

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