In the Piedmont region of North Carolina, there is one main nemesis to our beautiful lawn and turf areas. This enemy rears its ugly head early in the spring and then continues to advance past battle lines choking out the fescue we fought so hard the previous year to get. We panic and start fighting, but it is way too late. The enemy? Crabgrass.
Crabgrass is an evasive weed that customers call about after it’s too late to do anything to contain it. Crabgrass sets a seed in the fall that lays dormant until the spring. Crabgrass seeds will germinate when the soil temperature reaches three consecutive days of 50 degrees or more. Here in North Carolina the weather is very unpredictable. The old saying, “If you don’t like the weather today then wait until tomorrow” applies here more than anywhere.
That being said, we can easily experience three days of over night temperatures above 50 degrees as early as March. So this battle that we try so hard to fight in June really begins in February. Crabgrass can be eradicated by applying a pre emergent not allowing it to germinate. The best time to do that is in February with our spring fertilization. There are many fertilizers that come with the pre emergent mixed in, allowing us to kill two birds with one stone.
If you would like to get a leg up n the battle with crabgrass next year, give us a call. We would love to help you get on an aggressive turf program that starts with a Pre Emergent to defeat one of the nastiest weeds our turf has to battle. Lawns were made to be enjoyed, so let us take the work out of it for you.
