Centipede in bermuda

jbenetti – posted 17 October 2003 04:28

I have centipede growing in my bermuda lawn. I was told to wait until the bermuda goes dormant and spray the centipede with roundup grass killer. Won’t this also kill everything around it. I was also told I could put nitrogen down on the bermuda and it will kill the centipede since it doesn’t like it. My bermuda is nice, but the centipede it starting to take over in spots. HELP PLEASE !!

Brad – posted 13 November 2003 06:44

Centipede goes dormant just like bermuda does. If you wait until the bermuda is dormant and then spary round up on the centipede I would think the centipede will also be dormant so you’d be wasting your time and money. Another thing to think about is where you live. Unless you are somewhere north of Florida and are absolutely certain the bermuda is dormant, you run the risk of killing the bermuda too. I sprayed over my bermuda once in January when I lived in Atlanta and I was scared to death it would kill the whole yard. Fortunately, it worked OK, but I’ve always looked at that approach as playing with fire. You are correct about the Nitrogen. Bermuda absolutely loves it and centipede can’t tolearte much fertilizer or it will die (it’s the perfect lazy man’s grass as it requires very little fertilizer, water, mowing, etc.). However, at this time of year the bermuda is going dormant and you don’t want to put nitrogen on it now. I think you’d probably have to wait until the spring green-up and then hit the bermuda every month or month and a half with straight nitrogen (34-0-0). That would probably put a serious dent in the centipede problem.

Dchall_San_Antonio – posted 17 November 2003 09:51

Depending on where jbenetti lives, both grasses might remain green all year.

One of the prime “problems” with plants happens when the grower picks the wrong plant for the location or time of year. It could be that centepede will dominate bermuda and there’s nothing you can do about it. You might consider changing to either accept both grasses or even start to favor the one that wants to take over. Lots of folks love there centepede lawns.