Is there an herbicide, LEGALLY available, that will utterly kill any grasses and dandilions without poisioning the waterfoul or turn my yard and surrounding countryside into a desert wasteland?
I'd like to spray a 18" strip around my house's foundation to rid myself of all vegetation BEFORE I rototill it up and put down heavy fabric and rocks. But I fear that anything that can kill bermuda grass (of which I have an abundance) and rabbit brush will also lay my yard to waste
Roundup is probably the best choice from what is available w/o an applicators' license. It won't kill what it isn't applied to (that is, it isn't soil residual).
It will certainly kill Bermuda but unless you get rid of _all_ traces of Bermuda, being what it is, it'll soon be back from elsewhere. And, of course, having had it, even if you kill all the current living, the seed from previous is still around to germinate and start over again.
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Well I can live with that. As long as I put down a nice heavy black plastic sheet over the dirt and pile rocks on top I can take out any Bermuda grass stringers by hand. That part the really pisses me off about weeds is that they grow so nicely in the garden, under the eaves, in the bushes, but they don't seem to grow in the lawn to fill in those dead spots that I perennially have.
Eigenvector wrote: ...
That's undoubtedly because those dead spots have something locally wrong with them -- there's a rock just underneath the surface, a bunch of clay left over from the basement dig, too acidic/basic, any number of other things. If it's significant, find the problem(1) and fix it and you'll have weeds galore! :)
(1) To adequately determine what the problem really is might entail a soil sample if a little digging doesn't uncover an obvious cause...
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Ehh, I already know the answer, its just implementing it is more expensive than bitching and moaning about it.
Rototilling the entire front lawn would be more than I want to do just quite yet.
:)
Surely that wouldn't be necessary??? Unless it's really bad I'd think working on a spot at a time would be the trick and then maybe just rent a slit seeder and overseed some fall.
Unless, of course, the intent would be to try to eliminate the Bermuda although unless your neighbors do the same thing at the same time its futile...
{...Re: rototilling entire lawn/yard should be unnecessary...}
Of course, even tilling won't kill the Bermuda tillers -- they'll just get chopped up and regenerate. Only way to eliminate Bermuda entirely is chemically over a long period of time (like a full year) or cart off the infected topsoil. There is no practical way to eliminate all the root system by tilling and even when spraying as soon as the existing dies, there will be new coming from existing seed and that seed remains viable for years.
It's a bugger to eliminate. Bindweed is easier I think... :(
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Well I'm not worried about Bermuda grass in my lawn, so long as its greenish and doesn't have yellow flowers coming out of it I'm fine. I want to kill it around my foundation, but that's for other reasons. But it is a bitch to pull out of flower beds, pull one green shoot and before you know it you're pulling up this 2 foot long root connected to another and another and pretty soon your garden is toast.
Not telling me anything I don't know... :) :( It's the primary lawn here that was put in in the 30s or maybe even earlier. Of course, here where it's hot and dry, it does manage to grow where much else doesn't. What I don't understand is why they didn't use the native buffalo grass which is a jointed grass similar in many ways to Bermuda except slower growing and not as aggresively annoying and much easier to dig out...
About all that is even reasonably effective is, once you've gotten it cleaned out of a garden area is a deep border edging--but it has to be deep. The overland tillers aren't too tough if you get them before they fully root and joint again, but what comes from underground is, as you say, a pita.
BTW, the black plastic on it's own won't be enough--it'll just run under it and come out the other side. I've got it through the cracks between sill plates and foundations, cracks in basement walls, anywhere there's an opening...
Why is this called denuding? Shouldn't it be called nuding, and then denuding would be the opposite?
As in, "I bought the ship-wrecked and rescued children clothes in order to denude them."
I don't know what will kill "everything" but they stuff they use on corn fields sure kills everything except corn. So you might use something like that, unless you're being overrun by corn.
That stuff is also pretty short lived so you can plant something else in the field the next year.
One last thing on controlling Bermuda -- the most effective is shade -- it won't tolerate longterm shade so if you can arrange for that it will make it easier. Of course, not much help for those things that need sun, but just a point since you're seeming to be fighting the battle...
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My weeds have filled in my whole lawn. I guess I have better weeds.
roundup.
Pat wrote: ...
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Except for 2,4-D (broadleaf only) and Roundup (generically, glyphosate) it's virtually all others are restricted-use herbicides and what is used is almost always a combination of several.
For OP, Roundup is the choice...possibly add a little 2,4-D but the other broadleaf he mentions such as the dandy-lions are pretty easy. Of course, dandelions _in_ the yard where he wants to keep the grass is
2,4-D, _not_ Roundup. (And, he'll probably get some browning of the Bermuda, but it won't kill it).--
Black plastic will work, but there is no need to kill everything. If the only reason for killing stuff is to till, it will still be tough with remaining roots/sod. Cut the grass and put your fabric and rock on top. It isn't going to grow through the fabric and rock.
You apparently haven't tried to kill/control a fully-established Bermuda problem, then... :)
It will simply continue to tiller underneath the plastic/fabric and come out wherever the edges are. It's truly evil stuff where it isn't wanted. :(
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Hah, hah, hah, hah, hah!
Wait and see!
Been there.
I thought we just had another thread where someone said rototilling wasn't for yards, it was for gardens.
He said that raking or scraping or something was for grass.
P&M
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