Weed Control
Do You Need a License to Spray Your Own Lawn?
A pesticide applicator license turns on who holds the sprayer, not what is in it. What EPA restricts, and which state agency decides the rest.
Weed Control
Dandelions, clover, crabgrass, nutsedge — every weed has a weakness. Our guides show you exactly how to identify what's invading your lawn and remove it without harming your grass.
Weed Control
Best Brush Killer: The Method Decides the Formulation
Penn State: an oil-based triclopyr ester goes on any time after cutting; a water-based one must be applied immediately. Choose the method, then the bottle.
Weed Control
Best Weed Puller: How Much Root Did You Actually Get?
UC IPM: a dandelion taproot runs 6 to 18 inches and a 1-inch fragment regrows. The tool decides how much root you get — the weed decides if that is enough.
Weed Control
Dollarweed: The Weed That Tells You About Your Water
UF calls dollarweed a reliable indicator of wet environments. Clemson's first control step is not a herbicide — it is checking how often you irrigate.
Weed Control
Best Pre-Emergent: Purdue Says the Active Barely Matters
Purdue's finding is awkward for the aisle: prodiamine, pendimethalin and dithiopyr give equivalent control at the correct rate. The split decides it, not the brand.
Weed Control
Best Weed Killer for Centipede: The Sensitive One
NC State says it plainly: centipedegrass is sensitive to 2,4-D. It also wants no lime and almost no nitrogen — so the standard Southern routine is wrong three ways.
Weed Control
Best Weed Killer for St. Augustine: The Cultivar Decides
Common cannot take 2,4-D. Floratam cannot take atrazine. Bitterblue is weak on both. There is no St. Augustine answer until you know which one you have.
Weed Control
Best Weed Killer for Zoysia: Tolerance Is Not the Problem
Zoysia takes almost everything the other Southern grasses cannot. Its real limits are temperature, mowing gap and growth — and it recovers slowly when you miss them.
Weed Control
How to Kill Broadleaf Plantain: Read It First
Broadleaf plantain tells you something before you kill it — UMD lists dry, compacted soil and poor feeding as what favours it. Clemson's window is mid-autumn.
Weed Control
Chickweed and Henbit: Spring Spraying Is Too Late
How to get rid of chickweed and henbit: Clemson puts optimum post-emergence timing at mid-autumn. By the time you see spring flowers, the seed is already made.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Oxalis: It Comes Back Two Ways
Getting rid of oxalis in a lawn takes two fixes. Penn State: pre-emergents stop it from seed but have no effect on plants emerging from rhizomes.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Quackgrass: Wipe, Do Not Spray
Wisconsin Extension: selective herbicides are rarely an option. So the fix is a wiped, not sprayed, application of a non-selective — and once is not enough.
Weed Control
Fluazifop vs Clethodim: Same Group, Different Labels
Both kill grass and spare broadleaves, and both are Group 1 — so swapping them is not rotation. What separates them is which sites their labels allow.
Weed Control
Glyphosate vs Glufosinate: The Roots Are the Difference
Glufosinate is faster and matches glyphosate on annuals and nutsedge. NC State: it does not translocate throughout the plant — so perennials come back.
Weed Control
Triclopyr Ester vs Amine: Same Active, Different Risk
Both bottles say triclopyr. The words after it decide whether the spray stays where you put it — MSU measured ester drift injury at 50, amine under 20.
Weed Control
Bare Ground Herbicide: It Reaches Roots You Cannot See
NC State documents imazapyr injuring dogwood, Japanese maple and holly through root uptake. A bare ground herbicide does not stop at the line you sprayed.
Weed Control
Can You Mix Herbicides in One Tank? The Order Matters
NDSU: most broadleaf herbicides tank mixed with grass herbicides reduce grass control. The fix is sequence — grass herbicide one day before, or seven days after.
Weed Control
Herbicide Carryover in Compost: A Lab Test Can Miss It
Oregon State: chemical lab testing might not indicate herbicide contamination. Three actives survive an animal's gut and composting, sometimes for years.
Weed Control
Herbicide Surfactant vs Crop Oil: The Label Decides
Crop oil concentrate is 80–85% oil with only 15–20% surfactant in it. Not a stronger surfactant — a different product, and substituting can break the label.
Weed Control
How to Kill Bermuda Grass in a Fescue Lawn: Mow It Out First
Virginia Tech: tall fescue can completely kill bermudagrass at a 4-inch mowing height with no herbicide. Mow lower and no product will save you.
Weed Control
Why Didn't My Weed Killer Work? Six Causes, One Is the Product
Purdue: hard water can inactivate glyphosate, and more water in the tank can make it worse. Start from what you saw, not from which brand you bought.
Weed Control
Brush Control in Pasture: Mowing Multiflora Rose Spreads It
Penn State: a cane tip touching the ground roots and makes a new plant. Mowing takes three to six passes a season for over a year — or 8 to 10 goats per acre.
Weed Control
Food Plot Weed Control: Spraying Clover Without Killing It
Clover is a broadleaf, so broadleaf herbicide kills it. Three chemistries are selective enough not to — and the pre-plant kill is the one that matters most.
Weed Control
How Long After Roundup Can I Plant Grass? Purdue Says Same Day
Glyphosate has no soil activity, so it will not harm seedlings even seeded the same day. The real risk is which bottle you bought — not all Roundup is glyphosate.
Weed Control
How Long After Spraying Weed Killer Can I Mow? Two Waits
Iowa State gives two numbers, not one: do not mow 2 to 3 days before, and wait 3 to 4 days after. The half nobody asks about is the one that decides the result.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Wild Onions: A Two-Year Job
Round hollow leaves or flat solid ones? That tells you which plant you have. Neither dies in one season, and most sprays fail for a reason you can fix.
Weed Control
How to Kill Kudzu: The Big Root Is Not the Target
Alabama Extension: the large woody root cannot sprout. Kudzu regrows from root crowns at the soil surface — which is what you can actually reach and kill.
Weed Control
How to Kill Poison Ivy: The Rash Comes From Cutting It
UGA: the toxin is not normally on the outside surface of intact leaves and stems. So the dangerous act is breaking the plant — which is what pulling does.
Weed Control
How to Read a Pesticide Label: The Registration Number First
One EPA registration can carry eleven brand names. And a third set of digits means the label in your hand may be a narrowed version of the same product.
Weed Control
Moss in Lawn: Why Killing It Never Works
Moss is a symptom, not a cause. And the lime everyone reaches for is wrong more often than right — Illinois Extension says don't, without a soil test.
Weed Control
Pasture Weed Control: The Label Restriction Comes First
Grazing restrictions run from seven days to a year, and beef and dairy differ. UGA: without cultural practices, herbicide use will not be beneficial.
Weed Control
Seeding After Pre-Emergent: The Conflict Nobody Warns You About
A crabgrass barrier cannot tell your grass seed from a weed seed. Purdue's per-product delays, the three actives labelled for seeding, and the honest workaround.
Weed Control
Spraying Weed Killer in Hot Weather — and in Cold
Nebraska: best performance at 60–75°F, and avoid glyphosate below 40°F. Purdue: hot dry weather thickens the leaf cuticle, so the plant physically resists uptake.
Weed Control
Toxic Weeds in Horse Pasture: Wilted Leaves Are the Risk
UGA: fresh red maple leaves are not toxic, wilted ones are. Most toxic plants are unpalatable — so the danger is created by running out of forage, not by the plant.
Weed Control
Brassica Food Plot Weed Control: The Weeds You Cannot Spray
UGA on canola: no herbicide controls wild radish or wild mustard in it. In a turnip or rape plot the worst weeds share the crop's own family.
Weed Control
Wheat and Oat Food Plot Weed Control: A Stage, Not a Date
A cereal plot reverses every rule from a clover plot. 2,4-D goes on-label, clethodim kills the crop, and one clause about legumes rules out most mixed plots.
Weed Control
Weeds in Gravel and Driveways: Why They Keep Coming Back
Every ready-to-use bottle for hardscape is a contact killer. NC State: they knock down top growth only, and none have residual activity in soil.
Weed Control
When to Apply Pre-Emergent: The 55°F Rule Is Misread
55°F is when you spray, not when crabgrass germinates. Purdue puts germination at 57–64°F and the flood at 73°F. Confusing the two is why people are late.
Weed Control
Will Rain Wash Away Weed Killer? The Weed, Not the Brand
Purdue: differences in rainfastness among glyphosate products are generally small. What changes the rain-free period is the weed's size and species.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Clover in Lawn (Or Keep It On Purpose)
Clover spreads where nitrogen is short — it makes its own. Feed the turf and it recedes. If you still want it out, four actives work and one popular one is absent.
Weed Control
Pet Safe Weed Killer: What That Label Actually Promises
"Pet safe" is not a regulated claim, and most products sold under it kill grass as fast as weeds. The promise that is real: keep pets off until it dries.
Weed Control
How to Kill Creeping Charlie and Wild Violet
Creeping Charlie and wild violet shrug off standard three-way weed killer for two different reasons. Both answer to triclopyr — and to October, not spring.
Weed Control
Poa Annua: How and When to Kill Annual Bluegrass
Poa annua germinates in autumn, so the window to stop it closes in September — and on a cool-season lawn it is the same window you seed in. Not both.
Weed Control
Dallisgrass vs Crabgrass: One Comes Back Every Year
Dallisgrass and crabgrass look alike and need opposite strategies: crabgrass dies at frost, dallisgrass comes back from the same crown for years.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Crabgrass: Timing Beats Chemicals
Crabgrass is a timing problem — but one pre-emergent pass is not a whole season. UF/IFAS: season-long control takes a second application 6–9 weeks later.
Weed Control
How to Get Rid of Nutsedge: One Pull Does Nothing
Nutsedge ignores ordinary weed killer because it is a sedge. UC IPM: one pull does nothing — but pulling every 2 to 3 weeks drains the tuber underneath it.
Weed Control
Lawn Weed Identification: By Family in 60 Seconds
Lawn weed identification in 60 seconds: the three families, the field checks that separate them, and why broadleaf products do nothing to a sedge.
Weed Control
Kill Dandelions Without Killing Grass — For Good
Killing dandelions without killing grass comes down to the taproot: the selective herbicides that reach it, and the month they actually work.
Weed Control
Spring Weed Control: Soil Temp, Not the Calendar
Spring weed control is decided by soil temperature, not the calendar — a pre-emergent applied two weeks late does nothing at all. The trigger, and the plan.
Explore More Topics
Lawn Health Newsletter
Seasonal lawn reminders, on time
Pre-emergent windows, disease alerts and fertilization schedules for your region — one short email, right when your lawn needs it.
Free forever. Unsubscribe anytime. US lawns only (for now). This season's companion: the printable fall checklist.