Crabgrass
Specializing in safe, affordable Household Pest Prevention. Our Lawn & Plant Health Care services are a real alternative to "lawn spray" services. Our horticultural services are customized to suit the property. We inspect before any treating is done to determine the need. We care for St. Augustine grass, palms, azaleas, oaks and nearly every other plant you might find in the central Florida landscape. We also make recommendations for proper pruning, mowing and watering. Pest Prevention for homes and businesses is designed to stop pests before they enter the building. These pests includes ants, roaches, spiders and wasps. Stopping these pests before they make it inside is the safest and most efficient way to perform this type of service.
Can Crabgrass really be controlled in
St. Augustine Grass?
A number of years ago there was a selective herbicide available to professionals for treating Crabgrass in residential St. Augustine grass. This product has not been available for some time now and professionals have been at a loss for a crabgrass control method.
Preemergent herbicides are applied at certain times of the year to help prevent weeds in general. But frankly, the preventive effect of these products on Crabgrass is rather limited.
What we learned is that you can apply Baking Soda (Sodium Bicarbonate) to Crabgrass and gain a degree of control of small crabgrass patches. We later learned that Baking Soda laundry detergent works even better. There is also a commercially available crabgrass control product of which Baking Soda is an active ingredient.
This treatment is not a professional secret and anybody can try it if they like. However, it can be difficult to apply just the right amount. The Crabgrass should be wet and the powder sprinkled lightly on top. The goal is to neither apply too much nor too little. Initially the treated area turns black, then afterwards it turns a golden color. This method is not fool proof. No Crabgrass remedy is. It works especially fast though, and you can see results right away.
This treatment can cause some injury to the turf where it is applied. However, the St. Augustine grass usually recovers. The Crabgrass will also likely recover. This treatment tends to burn the Crabgrass leaves, but often the roots and stolons survive. For this reason it is important to limit treatments to small spots that the St. Augustine grass can possibly grow back into.
This is not a practical method for treating large areas or for patches where St. Augustine grass no longer exists. Usually some lawn renovation is in order to remove large Crabgrass patches. The University of Florida recommendation is to spray the crabgrass with Roundup nonselective herbicide and replace these areas with new sod.
We include these Baking Soda treatments as part of our regular Lawn Care service. We cannot guarantee Crabgrass free lawns nor will we always find and treat all that you may have. But we will give it our best effort and hopefully reduce the amount of Crabgrass that you would otherwise have.
