How to quickly de-weed my lawn?

11 years ago

Our lawn was hard hit by this year's drought. It wasn't great to begin with, but it got stressed. We're back to decent rainfall now, so it's greened back up, but we've got lots of weeds.

Our house is on the market, and it's at the higher end of the price range, so the front needs to look fabulous. How can we get rid of the clover and such and make it look more lush? Especially given that we're quickly headed toward winter. Not opposed to chemicals.

We're Zone 6 in the midwest. Here's a photo that gives some idea. This is actually a few months old, as we sodded the lamppost area and enlarged the RH bed, but it gives the best view of the natural lawn flora that I have on file. :-)

{{gwi:120184}}

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Comments (9)

grass1950
11 years ago
Quick? Before Winter? Nope.
dchall_san_antonio
11 years ago
If you were going to sell your home, why didn't you water the lawn?
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weedyacres
Original Author
11 years ago
Why didn't we water? Well, we have 3 1/2 acres, so keeping it all watered would have been cost prohibitive, and given that we don't have irrigation, time prohibitive as well, moving sprinklers around. We did water portions in front daily for three weeks in the midst of it and it had absolutely no impact except small parts partially shaded by our medium-sized trees. Seriously. This was an impossible drought. Compounded by the fact that many weeks neither of us was home during the week.

Sound like plan B is hope for early snow to cover it up? :-) How about a plan C, to go ahead and treat it to make it better come spring, because after all we may still be on the market then.
kimpa zone 9b N. Florida.
11 years ago
It looks pretty good to me. But I like natural lawns. It may be too late in your area for weed killers to be effective and for grass seed to take hold before winter. In my zone 6, SE pennsylvania, we say the last date for these things is october 15. And then if you kill alot of vegetation, you will have to fill in with grass seed or weeds will take over again. I would just keep it mowed and fertilize the areas close to your house in early November.
kimpa zone 9b N. Florida.
11 years ago
It looks pretty good to me. But I like natural lawns. It may be too late in your area for weed killers to be effective and for grass seed to take hold before winter. In my zone 6, SE pennsylvania, we say the last date for these things is october 15. And then if you kill alot of vegetation, you will have to fill in with grass seed or weeds will take over again. I would just keep it mowed and fertilize the areas close to your house in early November.
enigma7
11 years ago
Nothing will really work unless getting rid of the clover will not make portions of the lawn bare. There is a very effective clover killer (Ortho Weed B Gone Clover and Oxalis concentrate) that is cheap and very effective, but it takes (during warm times) about 2 weeks to fully kill. If the clover is heavy, IF it works you'll be left with a bare lawn.

Best advice if you don't care about the future buyers is to cut really short. Before getting rid of my clover I was always amazed how "nice" it looked when cut to 1/2-3/4" or so. All the white flowers would disappear, most of the clover leaves were mulched, and it just looked green. Not a great idea for the long-term process, but visibly it would make your lawn look green.

Another option that you can do in tandem with the short cutting is put down some annual ryegrass. It sprouts VERY fast, and will thicken up any bare spots and help to hide the clover. Again this is a temporary esthetics move, but that is likely all you care about. We'll take care of the new homeowners next year when they come searching for these forums! :) j/k
kidhorn
11 years ago
Nice House.

I think cutting it short so as to not have any flowers is a good idea. I doubt that a purchaser is going to balk at buying the house because of a few weeds in the yard. I wouldn't worry too much.
weedyacres
Original Author
11 years ago
The flowers aren't actually showing now, but the clover's still there.

I went grass seed shopping today and all that's on offer is tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass, so no annual ryegrass.

10-day weather forecast says tomorrow is the last warm day (an unseasonable 80 degrees) and then we're down to highs in the 50's, so I'm not optimistic that anything's going to germinate. And we had to use the warmer weather this week to reseal the blacktop on our driveway.

Sounds like our best (only?) option is to fertilize with some winterizing stuff with weed and clover killer (saw some in my shopping today), cut it short, and keep it edged nicely.
enigma7
11 years ago
Unless it has triclopyr in it (active ingredient in the ortho clover killer) I think a fertilizer with something to kill clover will not be effective.

Any mix that has a large percentage of rye will work (rye will sprout first followed by the others if possible). Most seed blends from the major brands (Rebel, Pennington, etc.) use at least 20% rye (and some a lot more). That is still a lot of rye and will fill in the bare spots quickly. Those temps don't matter as long as the low's aren't freezing routinely. 50's for highs are actually great because watering becomes less of an issue (and less chance for early seedling death if you are at work and forgot to water).