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While we have all ‘hunkered-down’ to avoid lightning/thunder and daily rains, our weed enemies have not been sleeping. Tiny flowers are blooming and seeds are being produced, shed to the soil, and sprouting anew. Seeds produced during the drought by small, struggling weeds have been just waiting for this opportunity.
During the calm between rain storms, put on your Crocs and mosquito repellent, and go scouting for weeds that are matured and full of seed. These pesky plants survive by having a very short life cycle. From seed germination to new seed production may only be a couple of weeks. Adolescent weeds’ goal in life is to reproduce.
Your first line of defense is always a healthy layer (2 to 3 inches) of mulch over all your soil surfaces. If you are lucky (or unlucky?) enough to have pine needles, that is a mulch that really helps in the weed battle. Finding bales of pine needles for sale likely requires a trip through Houston area garden centers and East Texas.
Finding and using a plentiful amount of Pine bark mulch is an easier task. I prefer Pine Bark Nuggets around shrubs. That rougher texture makes it harder for weed seeds to get their start. Weeds that do appear are usually easier to extract.
The #1 task is to carefully remove and dispose of weeds that are loaded with seed. Then, the next step is a carefully directed application of an herbicide spray to let the remaining weeds die in place. A small spritz bottle is a handy tool for that task. Keep in mind that the soil disturbance by pulling a weed can actually plant and help unseen weed seeds in that area to germinate.
If you attack the weeds with a carefully applied herbicide spray a few days before you cover them with a generous layer of mulch, you are employing the winning strategy. Use a shield of cardboard in one hand to keep spray drift off your favorite plants. Come back in a few days to spray missed weeds that are still healthy green.
You may feel that you are losing the weed battle, but you cannot surrender!
Resign yourself to the fact that each stroll to enjoy your landscape is really a scouting trip for invading weeds. If you ease up, the battle is lost.
The weed to never pull is Nut-grass or Nut-Sedge. There is a special herbicide formula for that. It is available pre-mixed in a spritz bottle, too. You spray the leaves and leave it to die. It’s gone in less than a month. Two or three repeat sprays over the run of a year and that battle is won. When you physically pull the sedges, that only multiplies them.
Leon Macha is a consulting, certified horticulturist/arborist with over 40 years of experience in our region.
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