By UAEX, Miller County
Just a reminder for people who have a spurweed problem. We are coming into the time of year to treat your yards with a pre-emergent.
Timing is key to control, and now is the time. The spurweed is a winter annual weed that germinates in the fall, producing a ground-hugging plant with parsley-like leaves. It grows in the fall and winter, blooms with tiny white flowers in late winter to early spring, then sets the seed which is the problematic sticker. This fall (mid-October thru November) use a pre-emergent herbicide, such as atrazine.
There are others but make sure it is compatible with your yard type, i.e. Bermuda, St. Augustine, Centipede, Zoysia, etc. This spring (February) spray with a post-emergent herbicide such as a three way like Trimec Southern or Trimec Classic or Fertilome Weed Out to kill the weeds before they set more seeds. There are numerous formulations of two and three way mixes of 2,4-D, dicamba and MCPP. Make sure you read the label before purchasing that they are safe for your particular southern grass. For instance, Bermuda tends to be more herbicide tolerant than St. Augustine, Centipede, or even Zoysia.
It may, in some cases, take an application of both a pre-emergent and post-emergent herbicide. When trying to control weeds, it’s a numbers game. You rarely achieve 100% control with one application. When using a pre-emerge herbicide, keep in mind you may have to come back with a post-emergent herbicide as a clean up to get any you missed with the pre-emergent. What’s the difference in a pre-emergent herbicide vs. a post-emergent herbicide? A pre-emergent is typically used to keep the seeds from germinating and in most cases has no effect on plants that have germinated and are already up. A post-emergent herbicide is used after a plant is already germinated and up.
Timing is key here, too! It’s easier to kill a small immature weed vs. a larger more mature plant. The key is to make the application early enough in the winter season to prevent the seed from germinating or going to seed. If you can do this, you will greatly reduce the population for next year, but if allowed to go unchecked, you will have more and more stickers each year!!!
Edit: this doesn’t just help control spurweed but many other cool season weeds as well
