Weeds in lawns is sadly a challenge that we have no choice but have to deal with as part of having a residential lawn. The key thing to remember is the better kept your lawn is and higher the density of your lawn is the less opportunity there will be for weeds to invade your lawn. In many ways this in itself is an incentive to keep your lawn well maintained as it provides natural resistance to weed infestation.
In Tasmania, the two main chemical options for weeds are MCPA and Dicamba. MCPA targets most weeds present in a lawn situation while Dicamba takes action against clover in your lawn. There is a readily available product call Kamba M which combines both products if you would like to target both weeds and clover at the same time.
If the population of weeds in your lawn is not too high and depending on the weed species, removing them by hand may not be as difficult as it sounds. Sometimes it’s just as quick and easy to remove them by hand as the result is instant.
Once weeds have been treated through chemical application or removed by hand, there are several things you can do to help the weed infested area to recover & help protect your lawn from re-infestation:
- Fertilise your lawn – this will assist recovery promoting a healthy lawn that is less likely to be reinvaded by weeds
- Re-seed thin areas– if there are bare spots in your lawn from the weeds dying or being removed, if weak or thin areas are just left, it’s likely that weeds will creep back into these areas.
- Be careful not to over-water – as we know weeds respond quickly to water, if your lawn is being overwatered it’s likely that weeds will be promoted over grass and eventually take over.
