3 Common winter weeds

Winter weeds can be a real nuisance and undo all the hard work you put in getting your lawn looking superb during the warmer months.

The best time to treat winter weeds in your lawn is during autumn. By doing so, you have more chance of getting them before germination, which will stop them from dropping their seeds back into the soil and coming back again next season.

Here are 3 of the most common weeds that appear during winter and what you can do to remove them from your lawn.

Wintergrass

Winter Grass (Poa Annua) is a low growing turf grass. It has soft, drooping green leaves grown in tufts with triangular shaped seed heads. If you allow Winter Grass to drop its seeds, next winter it will be back, twice as bad as it was the previous year.

Winter Grass can be removed easily by hand as grows in clumps and doesn’t have particularly deep roots and it doesn’t have any runners.

Using a combination of a pre-emergent like Oxafert and a selective Winter Grass control like Winter Grass Killer at the correct time of year should ensure Winter Grass is eradicated from your lawn. Amgrow Winter Grass Killer is safe to use on buffalo lawns (including Sir Walter DNA Certified), blue and common couches, but should be avoided on Kikuyu and red fescue lawns.

Bindii

Bindii is possibly the most annoying weed due to the pain it causes to our bare feet! Bindii is a low growing weed with a flower at its centre. At maturity, the flower produces a prickly seed pod which is a particular menace during the warmer months when we are trying to enjoy our lawns. Bindii can be managed by hand or by applying a selective broadleaf herbicide like Bin-Die or Lawn Solutions Australia All Purpose Weed Control. This will help to eradicate these weeds in all lawn types including kikuyu and couch and are safe to use on most varieties of buffalo except the ST varieties. Be sure to read the label prior to applying to your lawn. A repeat application may be required.

The best time to target Bindii is in winter before it produces the seed pod and spreads further throughout your lawn.

Creeping Oxalis

Creeping Oxalis has small light green heart shaped leaves, very similar in appearance to clover. (Oxalis, have heart shaped leaves while clover has oval shaped leaves.) The flowers are small, about 3-4mm in diameter and bright yellow in colour containing five petals. Creeping Oxalis, as its name suggests, quickly runs along the surface of the soil and produces roots from the leaf as it goes. When seed pods mature they dry out and explode, causing the seed to spread.

Once again, a selective herbicide such as Lawn Solutions Australia All Purpose Weed Control will help to eradicate these weeds in all lawn types including kikuyu and couch and are safe to use on most varieties of buffalo except the ST varieties.

Remember to always follow manufacturer’s instructions on the pack and if in doubt call 1300 TURFCO for more specific advice.