People Spend Hours Pulling Weeds Between Pavers: What He Used Instead Covered the Whole Driveway
Weeds between driveway pavers create a job that can stretch across hundreds of joints. Pull one clump and another sits a few inches away. On this driveway, grass had also pushed through the gaps, turning entire rows of brick green.
Instead of working through those joints by hand, Philip Baron of YouTube channel ecologicaltime tried a different approach: covering the paving with coarse swimming pool salt. He used 25 kg bags, spread the salt across the bricks, then swept it into the cracks with a broom.
The treatment didn’t clear the driveway on contact. The change came over several days, and the grass held on longer than the smaller weeds. Three weeks later, Baron returned to see how much had grown back.
He covered the pavers with pool salt
Salt wasn’t poured onto individual weeds. It was scattered across the driveway so the whole paved area received a layer.
A broom moved the crystals off the faces of the bricks and toward the joints. Those gaps mattered more than the surface because that was where the grass and weeds were rooted.
Once the salt sat between the pavers, he wet the driveway. Water started dissolving the coarse crystals and carrying the salt into the gaps instead of leaving it piled on top.
One day later, the green growth had started to change
The first check came the next day. Weeds that had been green before the treatment were turning darker, with some sections showing more change than others.
Coarse crystals were still sitting across parts of the driveway. They had not dissolved after the first watering, so more water was added to break down what remained.
Grass was slower to respond. While smaller weeds had started changing color, several strips of grass between the bricks were still green.
Two days later, the weeds were dry enough to remove
By the second day, much of the growth had gone from green to brown. Stems and leaves had dried, leaving dead material sitting inside the joints.
At that point, the job changed from pulling live weeds out by their roots to clearing dry growth from the paving.
Salt was still visible in some areas, which prompted another light watering. The grass remained the tougher part of the test.
The grass took five days
Five days after the salt went down, the grass had caught up with the weeds. Green strips visible at the start had turned brown across much of the driveway.
Not every joint responded the same way. A few patches remained where bricks sat close together, leaving little room for salt to fall between them.
That difference offered a clue about the result. Where salt reached the joint, growth died. Where the crystals stayed above the gap, some grass survived.
Three weeks later, he checked for regrowth
Killing the visible weeds was only half the test. The bigger question was what would happen after the brown growth had been cleared.
Three weeks after applying the salt, the homeowner returned to the driveway. He reported that more than 99% of the treated area remained free of weeds and grass.
A few patches had returned and would need another treatment, but areas that had been filled with green growth before the application still had bare joints.
Pool salt comes with a catch
The same property that makes salt hostile to weeds makes it risky around plants you want to keep. Salt reaching soil beside a driveway can damage lawn grass, garden plants, shrubs, and tree roots. Repeated applications can also allow salt to build up in the ground.
Paving can present another issue. The homeowner warned that porous bricks may develop a white, efflorescence-like appearance after treatment. Some salt was still visible on his driveway after several days, though watering and rain helped clear the residue.
Salt exposure can also affect some masonry, concrete, mortar, and metal, so the method isn’t a replacement for hand weeding in every paved space.
What made this driveway test stand out was the scale. He didn’t crouch over each crack or pull hundreds of weeds one at a time. Bags of pool salt went across the paving, a broom pushed it into the joints, and water carried it farther into the gaps.
The weeds showed the first change within a day. Grass took longer. By day five, most of the green growth had turned brown, and three weeks later, most of those joints were still clear.
Does the three-week result make pool salt worth trying on driveway weeds?