And others like Peacock, Comma and others.
Nettles are suposed to be little powerhouses of nutrition but yet to explore the recipes
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My point was cutting them regularly and stopping any new growth kills them out, running a mower over them will go that and after that they can do what they like with the area.
You tend to find digging them out works to a certain degree, but like bishop weed, mares tail etc if you don’t get it all, they just come back.
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I would like to return part of the land back to lawn as its been a nightmare ever since we cut it out to create a ‘pretty flower bed at the end of the garden’ (ha ha!)
Just not sure that the grass will grow back by itself especially if I have to keep going over with the mower to keep the nettles down.
Any empty patch of earth we have here only ever seems to grow weeds…
Yes,absolute bugger. But with a crop like potatoes you will be harvesting so not left alone.
We took that approach with a huge areaof bracken,and it works as long as we keep on top of it.
For mare"s tail what has worked is to improve fertility
The easiest is just the young leaves into a teapot and hot water on top. 
Nature abhors a vacuum.
This is far easier than pulling and digging. Always used it on my hedgerows and fields.
[
Nettleban - BASF herbicide - Agrobase
https://agrobaseapp.com › ireland › pesticide › nettleban
](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiynYPPgcf-AhVOUaQEHU_qC9gQFnoECBMQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fagrobaseapp.com%2Fireland%2Fpesticide%2Fnettleban&usg=AOvVaw0fjJd45M-gTmV9PptbqwNx)
For the control of perrenial Nettles and broad-leaved weeds in grassland. An emulsifiable concentrate containing 85g/litre (8.22% w/w) dicamba, …
Why pour yet more unnecessary chemicals on the land? What harm do nettles etc do anyway? So they look messy, well that’s nature - lots of creatures like them.
If you don’t put poison on them you can eat them.
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Good stuff Fiskars. Quality tools that last forever.
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Seconded with as much support as I can
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The strongest chemicals we use are vinegar for weeding and washing up liquid for aphids as we have fish ponds, a moat, streams, two wells and a river, so I’m not taking any chance with the fish and frogs using any chemicals
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Our house is 10 years old, and we still have that problem. Find new bits of building cr** every year. I also have a huge pile of lumps of granite that I’ve dug up, so I think there must also have been some stone structure on the land before the house was built. Mind you, the granite is very useful for rockeries and other things.
Were you a commercial farmer? Otherwise why harm wildlife and soil for your convenience? This has, for example, been shown to reduce number of bird eggs that hatch. What’s a hedgerow without birds.
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France is trying to reduce the chemicals used…
So, so agree.
In fact I really don’t know why nettles are such an issue. After rain it is incredibly easy to pull their roots out. Just grab a plant, low down near the ground and yards of root come up with the plant… If necessary use a large fork (NOT spade) and keep it virtually horizontal and just shake the fork through the roots to knock the earth off. An alternative is to cut the nettles right down to the ground and cover with grass cuttings for a season. The nettle roots love running through the cuttings and are even easier to pull out.
I hasten to say I HATE weeding and heavy duty gardening. I love projects, but not the mundane repeating tasks so I can assure you my advice is aimed at people who go in for gardening-light. And that includes not using vinegar etc - anything that kills a plant is also killing bacteria, bees, worms, beetles, spiders, mites, slugs, snails, frogs, lizards, etc, etc.
We tend to think it’s big agribusiness that is responsible for the demise of the species on our planets. Gardeners have a lot to answer for.
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I don’t have a single weed in my garden, though there is plenty of greenery, and I will go out tomorrow if it is dry and mow or cut the fast growing grasses but that is the extent of my gardening.
However I do sympathise with @Danielle_Robins in being so overrun, fortunately, or otherwise if I wanted to eat or drink them, our ground is not to the liking of nettles. 
I take it you don’t cut grass then, as that kill all of the above as well, where do you draw the line 
Danielle, we had a 100m2 patch of 2m high nettles. The previous owners had sprayed them to no effect (on the nettles, forget about the wildlife!), we’d tried cutting them, to no effect. The only thing that worked for us was to hand dig out the roots, over several weeks. And of course you don’t get all of then out, but what came back in later years was minor and could be pulled out then. Within a shortish space of time grass from the field took over, and we restored the whole area to rough grassland, which barn owls etc loved.
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Good tip about fork not spade.
Our issue here is blackberries which keep coming back. Three or four years ago I did a massive clearance and got them all out bar one small inaccessible corner. I was covered in scratches (hardly any protective clothing withstands blackberries) and looked like I was tattooed intensively all over. But so so satisfying to finally pull them all up.
I measured a couple of the root trains I’d literally dragged out of the earth and they were single root runs of well, well over 100 feet.
They are creeping back now though so I will have to find some protective clothing and go around the property again before they really take hold.
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Once cleared - if you want to regrow your lawn mix grass seed with white clover seed
Clover is fast germinating, but will not crowd out the grass. Mown regularly with the rest of your lawn will eventually eliminate any regrowth of nettles
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