What is this weed?!

atoner – posted 04 August 2003 21:29

I’m trying to figure out what kind of weed is growing in my yard. I have a mix of bermuda and fesuce with…something else. I see a lot of it here in North Carolina. It grows low, has broader leaves than the other grasses, is bright/light green, and doesn’t react to broadleaf weed killer (the kind that is supposed to kill grass but not weeds.) It grows with shallow roots, dies off with freezes, and doesn’t grow back until the summer. The color is an annoying contrast to my other grass, but at least it grows where nothing else does. Any ideas? How can I get rid of it? Thanks.

Johnny245 – posted 05 August 2003 12:46

I have the same problem!Broad leaf grass, runs really low, lighter green color.

Looks really bad cuz it contrasts to your lawn’s darker green.

If you ever figure out what this is and how to get rid of it, e-mail me to

jo*******@ya***.com

atoner – posted 07 August 2003 18:24

OK, here’s a picture. Many of these grow together to form a very dense, low grass that’s brighter and lighter than the other grass (bermuda and fescue).

http://home.earthlink.net/~awtoner/grassweed.jpg

Thanks for the help,Adam

Will-PCB – posted 07 August 2003 19:13

Crabgrass.

edit note: tried to make the image display here, but Phil apparently has turned off the [IMG] tag for this forum. LoL!

[This message has been edited by Will-PCB (edited 07 August 2003).]

VooMan – posted 09 August 2003 13:01

Whoa yeah, it’s crabgrass alright… I battle that beast myself.

Right now I am testing a few things to kill the crabgrass without hurting my bermuda:

1. Bayer weed killer for lawns. Even at the lowest concentration I have had some spots of bermuda that get severely injured. Sometimes it works perfectly, and sometimes I get some damage. Not sure what I may be doing wrong, so I have since switched to…

2. Ortho Crabgrass Killer for lawns. With this product I changed my style a bit. Instead of mixing it up in my Buck Rogers backpack sprayer, I have started to use a simple windex type bottle. With that I can get up close and spray right onto the crabgrass without hitting much of the bermuda. That is working quite well so far. I’ve got a bunch of yellow, dying crabgrass, and the bermuda around it is unharmed. :-)))

3. I am very impressed with Dchall San Antonio’s organic lawn care methods. In another thread (located at https://turfgrass.com/ubb/Forum13/HTML/000072.html) he mentioned that crabgrass can be killed off with simple household baking soda. I am testing this method right now… Last night I took a spray bottle of water, gave the crabgrass a little spritz to make it wet, then I sprinkled some baking soda on it. I am hoping that works well for me so I can stop buying all these poisonous chemicals. 🙂

Andrew

seed – posted 10 August 2003 17:22

Will, you can post an external image link, either using UBB code explained here, UBB Code, or simply as a URL (e.g., http://floridaturf.com/chinch/feeding.jpg ) which converts automatically to a UBB Code hyperlink. Either way, visitors can click the link to see your external image.

I only turned off the display of external images within a message, partly because of copyright concerns, also because some material that had been posted was pretty unusual and far off-topic for a turfgrass web site.

Another alternative for posting images is that if anyone has helpful images for this site, please email them to me at:

ed****@tu*******.com











and I will post them. Please be sure to mention in your email that it is okay for me to post the image(s) to this site.

Thanks,

Phil

Jims’ Turf – posted 10 August 2003 17:51

Yep, Crabgrass. I used baking soda also and got some pretty good results. Then I found a product called Crabrass Control. It has only been out for about 3-4 months. It is an all natural product also. The active ingredient is cinnamon bark. The ingredients sound like a cake mix but it sure takes out crabgrass and some other kinds of weeds also. I buy it on line at www.crabgrassalert.com . I am on my third bottle. It cost more then baking soda but in the long run I think it is cheaper because it spreads out so thin and evenly that I can cover more ares because it doesn’t clump. It says it is safe for St. Augustine, Common Bermuda, and Bahia.

Will-PCB – posted 10 August 2003 22:54

Yes Phil your exactly right. I am pretty fluent with UBB code, and I was aware that you could link to the image, but I did not read the page close enough to see thta the IMG tag is turned off.

Never once thought to worry about copywrite issues, but I guess thats a good thought on your part.

VooMan – posted 10 August 2003 22:54

Hi Jim’s Turf,

I’m going to look into that… I put out some baking soda two nights ago, and I think I put too much. This morning I had the joy of looking at some very sick, black, dying crabgrass, but I also had yellowing bermuda as well. I’ll try to use less baking soda next time and see how it goes. I’m going to check out that website as well. Thanks for the tip! 🙂

So far though, the leader in my experiment is the Ortho Weed Be Gone Crabgrass Killer. After five days the crabgrass is yellow and sick looking, while the bermuda around it seems totally uneffected.

Andrew

redbird – posted 11 August 2003 09:03

I understand that this will not help the original poster regarding his crab grass, but I thought that I would share an interesting tidbit:

The Empire Zoysia sod that I purchased this year had some crabgrass in it. I grumbled about it, not willing to make brown patches in my new lawn killing it off with round-up and not wanting to live with it for the rest of the year. The sod farm told me to not worry about it, – keep the lawn cut and the zoysia will choke out the crab grass. Believe me or don’t (I wouldn’t have believed it) but it has happened. On a 5-6 day cutting cycle, the empire zoysia has filled in so dense that it choked out the crabgrass – all gone!

Mike

Sir Skrip – posted 11 August 2003 12:27

Hmm… I have that same problem. Normally I pull it out by the roots. Sometimes it is hard to get it by the roots. But I have St. Augustine and I would assume the St. Augustine would overpower it in time anyways.

That picture that was shown about this ‘weed’, well, isn’t the crabgrass the one who has those long stalks that open up at the end? Because I have the one I mention, as well as the one that was shown. The one that was shown sometimes looks like St. Augustine, but it grows in one clump just like that picture. I have never seen the crabgrass stalks come out. Unless there are 2 different types of crabgrass. I’m a bit confused.

Sir Skrip – posted 12 August 2003 09:09

Okay, nevermind. I found some of this ‘weed’ crap on my planters that I havent done yet, and yes, it is crabgrass. It grew those stalks I mentioned.

CheeseToast – posted 13 August 2003 20:06

For crabgrass and other weeds, I believe there is a “pre-emergent” available that you apply in late winter/early spring before the grass comes out of dormancy. I’ve seen it at Wal-Mart in the winter time. I think the key is getting it on at the right time. I’ve always been just a little too late — I’m not reminded of it until the weeds and crabgrass come out.

atoner – posted 13 August 2003 21:15

I’m giving the Ortho Crabgrass killer a try. It’d be nice if it came in a size larger than 1 pt (2000 sq. ft.). I just sprayes it tonight, so I should have results in a week. If it can kill off the crabgrass without killing the fescue (so the new fescue can find dirt when I seed in a few weeks) I’ll be quite happy.

VooMan – posted 14 August 2003 10:30

Atoner,

I have probably spent a fortune on weed killers and such, mixing a batch into a four gallon sprayer and going to town with it…

What I’ve been doing recently with the Ortho crabgrass control is I mix a tablespoon of the concentrate into a 32oz. spray bottle. I get up really close to the weed and give it a little sprtiz. Then I leave it alone…

I have had excellent results with crabgrass that way, and I’ve probably saved myself some money. It’s also less stressful on the surrounding grass…

That’s my two cents. Hope it helps. 🙂

Andrew

Jims’ Turf – posted 14 August 2003 14:23

Cheesetoast, you are right, there are a lot of pre-emergent herbicides on the market. I have tried many of them with very little success for mostly the same reason you mentioned, “timing”. The germinating season for crabgrass and weeds can start at a different time evrey year. Putting it down to early can be just as useless as putting it down to late. They are also a bit exspensive to play the guessing game for me. Besides, when I do have a problem with crabgrass it is not over my entire lawn. So I just check it when I mow, flag the area finnish mowing and go back with my crabgrass control mentioned in previous post. This approach has saved me a lot of money. I think the window of time that the pre-emergent is effective is also very small in comparison to the germinating season of crabgrass and weeds in warmer climates. I’m in central Florida.

Lex – posted 24 August 2003 07:47

Definitely recommend a pre-emergent. It prevents crabgrass and many other weeds. Crabgrass spreads by root and seed. Anyone know what the recommended application rate is for bermuda?

Crabgrass grows happily in my front yard that has St. Augustine. None grows in my back where I have zoysia (homeowner association will not let me grow zoysia in the front).

atoner – posted 24 August 2003 21:20

The Ortho crabgrass killer is doing a good job. After almost 2 weeks in the front yard, I now have the uniform light green of bermuda and dark brown dead crabgrass instead of the bright green. I bought a few more bottles and did the side and back yards last week. I still have another bottle to do re-treatment. This should help with next month’s seeding.