Am I the only one having a massive breakout of winter weeds? At first, I thought I could ignore them, but now they worry me in terms of really crowding out the grass. Here's a picture of the main culprit, this is carpeting my lawn in various areas, especially and naturally where in the summer I had crabgrass and in the bare spots. Is there anything to put on there now? This hard to pull, all fine-haired and stuff. Background - first year of organic lawn care, have used 20lbs/1000sqft of organics about once a month, the last time 30 days ago. Have not used any pre-m because I'm intimidated by those. Wanted to research pre-m for February app, but I thought winter would be no big deal so I ignored it. Overall, grass is nice and green, really like it other than the weeds.

I don't know your timing for pre m but I would spray a safe herbicide for your lawn and kill whatever that is. Then I would get that pre m down and go on with life. Get it now before it does take over. If it was a true winter weed I would die in the summer but who wants to wait that long.

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Well, intimidation... I like to get the best, which is liquid Barricade, but I didn't want to get into ordering online, getting the equipment I would need, etc. As for this weed, I have no idea what it it and so I don't know what to buy to put on it.

It looks like clover to me but I am in a total different area then you. I would use weed-b-gone on it in my lawn but I don't think that is safe for your type of lawn. I would go to a big box or local store and pick up weed killer. Read the back and make sure it is safe for st augustine.

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Oxalis. Click here for more information Very difficult to get out by hand as you've seen. Some kinds put little bulbs in the ground to spread or come back even after you pull it or leave it on top of the soil. It crowded out my neighbor's yard in late summer and now she has big patches of mess.

I still try to pull most of it out (I find searching for little weeds and destroying them very therapeutic after work) but if it's growing right now a St A- safe selective herbicide should take it down easily.

I've had trouble getting herbicides to stick to it, some sort of waxy coating or hairs on the leaves, so I mix in few drops of dish detergent (your BL conditioner would also work) and hit it with atrazine. (I mean, atrazine if you don't mind hurting the frogs.) At the scheduled rate with some warm weather atrazine is much slower than glyphosate or 2,4-D for me, taking about 1-2 weeks for effect.

I guess I have to bite the bullet and get into the chemicals, PreM and postM. Wishful thinking was "pound it hard with grains" and... Voila: grass grows, crowds out weeds. Not working (yet).

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versstef1 wrote: "pound it hard with grains" and... Voila: grass grows, crowds out weeds. Not working (yet).

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You will get there someday. Just remember if grass is doing great then weeds will do even better.

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Vinegar will kill oxalis overnight...on a hot sunny day. It is also a little hard on St Augustine, so minimize the overspray by using pieces of cardboard to shield the grass.

Wishful thinking was "pound it hard with grains" and... Voila: grass grows, crowds out weeds. Not working (yet).

I think that the whole "crowd out the weeds" premise is wildly overstated. It's not that it isn't true, it's more that the end-state isn't what the less-experienced person is asking for. Give a person that has a beautiful thick lawn a beer and ask him/her how long it took to get to that point - honestly. It's really a minimum of five years. That is like "forever" to a person struggling with a plethora of weeds this year. In other words, it's like financial planning - much easier when you've escaped the hand-to-mouth period, but very difficult to get that first phase accomplished.

The only advice that I have seen that really can accelerate getting to the "thick-lawn-means-few-weeds" point is don't disturb the soil any more than absolutely necessary. Disturbing the soil recharges the weed-seed supply. The best way to have few weeds next year is to have fewer weeds producing seeds this year. Over the course of numerous years, the seed-bank of weed seeds gets depleted. I now can limit my treatment of broadleaf weeds to an occasional stop to pull a weed while I'm mowing. But it wasn't always that way.

And yes, I realize that the "fewer weeds next year comes from fewer weeds this year" is circular logic. We may not like that answer, but it doesn't make it any less true.

andy10917 wrote:And yes, I realize that the "fewer weeds next year comes from fewer weeds this year" is circular logic. We may not like that answer, but it doesn't make it any less true.

My grandmother used to say for every weed you pull this year, you'll have a hundred less to deal with next year. I really believe that, especially when it comes to the prolific seed producers like chickweed.

I'm going to continue doing what I'm doing, but I need to get a soil test and I'll get some pre-m this time. Looks like I can for once just not try to be perfect and mess w/ the liquid barricade and just get granular w/ Dimension. It's gotta be better than doing nothing.