Before After
Weeds are the bane of every lawn lover’s life. You have your beautiful, pristine lawn looking like a postcard, and then those nasty weeds poke their nasty heads up.
First you may blame your lawn mowing contractor because you think they brought the weeds in on their mower, however that is one of the oldest lawn myths – the lawn mower is the least likely source of weeds in your lawn.
Weeds are more likely to already be in your soil profile, or they may come in on the wind or with the rain. If you think weeds come in on lawnmowers, have you ever thought how those weeds got in the gutter?
Our philosophy of best practice weed management starts by having a dense and healthy coverage of lawn with a balanced nutritional base in the soil profile which will reduce the incidence of weeds in the first place. However, if you are starting your lawn journey with a large infestation of weeds you will need a good quality post-emergent herbicide to eradicate what is already there. Once that has killed those pesky weeds off, it is now time to start working to reduce the built-up seed bank that may be in the soil profile. Using a pre-emergent herbicide such as Barricade every six months in Spring and Autumn will go a long way to breaking the weed cycle.
It is important to remember that over time, the weeds will develop a resistance if you use the same product to get rid of them year on year. You see, herbicides work by targeting a particular cellular process of the weeds in order to kill them. Each different cellular process that is targeted is called a Mode of Action (MOA). If you continue using herbicides that contain chemistry with the same MOA group, over time the weeds will build up a tolerance, so it is important to change your product to one that contains a different MOA group every few years to maintain their effectiveness.
Please remember to read the label as these contain all the safety precautions required to apply these herbicides. Equally as important is getting the rate of herbicide per square metre correct as this significantly impacts the efficacy of the product. And of course, if you would prefer a licenced and professional pesticide operator, we at Positively Green can take care of it all for you with either one of our one-off services or through one of our annual packages. Check them out at www.positivelygreen.com.au/plans
