Crabgrass…I Think…PLEASE HELP

Jeff E – posted 05 May 2005 17:45

We live in West Texas and just moved into a house late last year. We have Bermuda grass but I wasn’t able to get the Crabgrass preventer down soon enough. I did however, Roundup the crab that existed and that seemed to have done a good job (i.e., I believe I had gotten it all). But in the last several weeks (only about a month after the last crab preventer application…this made two applications in a row), I have noticed a wide blade grass popping through the Bermuda. It isn’t clumping like typical crabgrass, but has a similar blade to crab. The odd thing is, when I dig along the blade (these are just single blades) to try to find the root, many times it seems as though the blade is actually connected to what appears to be an old Bermuda root. The previous owner never fertilized and I fertilize every 2 months. Is this simply individual strands of Crab comming through? or is this some sort of shocked Bermuda that just has a wide blade and with more cuttings will turn into regular Bermuda. I would have thought that with the applications of the preventer, any new crab would have not come through…I am at my wits end…please help.I could easily take a picture on a digital camera for viewing, but I am new to this site and don’t know how to attach files. If anyone needs a picture, please let me know what I have to do to attach files. Thanks everyone…

Jeff

ted – posted 10 May 2005 13:37

post a pic to the editor or give us a website with pics.

Dchall_San_Antonio – posted 13 May 2005 22:58

If you are unfamiliar with it, St Augustine looks like crabgrass. Real crabgrass would not have been growing then, although now it is coming very soon.

If you do not want St Augustine to totally take over your bermuda, stop watering altogether. In about 2-3 weeks (Mother Nature permitting) the St Augustine should die out and the bermuda, if it suffered at all, should return normally when you restart watering. Also you can reset your mower to the lowest setting; bermuda likes that.

ted – posted 15 May 2005 12:07

i’m guessing you’re looking at dallisgrass.-not affected by pre-ems.