Glyphosphate antidote for lawns

[Andrew Gabriel]

Council appear to have sprayed a jet of some weed and grass killer across my lawn when killing the weeds on the footpath. I don't suppose there's any antidote, particularly now it shows up quite clearly? Probably happened a couple of weeks ago -- I noticed an area last week which wasn't very green and watered it. By this week, it's very clear from the pattern of the dead area exactly what's happened, a dead spray shaped area with a sharp cutoff caused by the gate post. Also, it's dying at the same rate as the weeds on the pavement.

[Rob Morley]

Transplant some turf from a less noticeable area? The poisoned bit will recover eventually.

[Ian White]

Or from the lawn in front of the Council Offices?

[jg.campbell.ng]

Roundup. At this time of year it could take two weeks or more to show effect; IMHO, once you've noticed the symptom, it's curtains -- particularly for grass. Oddly enough, it seems that buttercups can recover after a period of looking very jaundiced.

In my area (Derry, N. Ireland) the council uses young hooligan lookalikes on quads for weed spraying; IMHO a danger to more than weeds and lawns.

Jon C.

[Andrew Gabriel]

This lawn area didn't have any weeds, and is some type of very fine grass (it doesn't get walked on). I've managed to keep it looking very nice through the summer, until the council buggered it up.

I did use glyphosphate IIRC on a lawn (different house) where there was no grass and it had all been overtaken by some weed which the selective weedkillers wouldn't touch. Weeds would happily grow again within a couple of months, but grass took a year before it would start growing there.

Ah -- I saw a quad driving up the pavements, probably a couple of weeks ago. I wondered what it was doing but would not have been able to see any spraying from where I was.

I think I'll be on the phone to the council tomorrow.

[Andy Hall]

Andrew, I would suggest taking some photos immediately and then speaking to the highways dept. at the council in terms of some compensation - especially as this is a fine grade lawn and is not going to be cheap to fix. You can't just get any old grade of replacement turf because the colours and species are unlikely to match.

Unfortunately I don't have a high expectation that they have a proper mechanism to address this kind of issue in terms of paying you the fair market rate to fix it. Simple logic would suggest obtain two quotes for a proper fix and send them the bill. However, as one TV scifi once had as a famous line - "We are not programmed to respond in that area" - i.e. not commercially minded.

Then you are faced with how much time do you want to spend on recovering something from them.

Perhaps a call to the local press to see if they are short of a human vs. big brother story, if it becomes necessary?

[Rob Morley]

If Big Brother had been watching the audience would have seen the careless spraying incident and voted him out of the house :-)

[Chris Bacon]

I very much doubt it. Try u.r.g.

Telephone them and explain, nicely - they have untold millions of people giving them ear-ache straight off. They will probably be using a contractor, and are insured in any case. Say what's happened, e-mail pics/get someone to come around for a look. You're best off turfing for a quick fix. Select an appropriate turf to blend in with existing.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Yes, I already did that.

I'll start by asking them what it was they sprayed. If it was Glyphosphate, I will try contacting Monsanto and asking their advice on de-toxifying the ground. I know from past experience grass won't grow again for around a year. (I wonder if they do a GM-modified lawn grass seed? ;-)

For patching after I raked out the moss last year, I used B&Q's fine (no course/rye) grass seed, which blended in OK. It's really too late in the year to seed grass now, and in any case, based on my past experience, it won't grow in that area for a year. Turf might have the same problem unless some depth of topsoil is replaced first.

I might also suggest they get their parks department to fix it, which would probably be the cheapest option for them, if I could trust them to do a good job.

Yes. The more I think about this, the more it's pissing me off. I am one of the increasingly few people in the road who try to maintain a front garden. Could just give up and concrete it all over like nearly everyone else has.

[Andy Hall]

They don't really have a good track record up to this point, do they?

I wouldn't invite that, because then you lose control over what happens. far better to pick your own contractor and deal with it on a purely financial basis.

Do they use a 3rd party subcontractor for doing the path weeding by any chance? I think that I'd ask that question as well to see who is supposed to take responsibility. I would imagine that a subcontractor would have to take responsibility to indemnify the local authority for any c*ck ups they make and have insurance to cover it. That could be an angle

I think I would be as well. It's not so much the cost but the invasion of privacy and careless disregard for your space and property.

If it was otherwise regularly abused and became an uphill struggle to maintain, then fine. For a one-off and stupidity, then I wouldn't give up.

[Cicero]

================ How big is the damaged area? If it's only a small area then it's possible you've been been visited by a lazy dog fox with a bad aim.

Cic.

[Will Dean]

There's some confusion here. The whole point about Roundup/Glyphosate is that it *doesn't* poison the ground - it's absorbed through the foliage of plants and poisons them, but not the soil.

That's why, for example, people growing trees commercially can spray round their trunks with Roundup, and why cereal and oil-seed-rape growers often spray entire crops with roundup late in the season, without impacting their ability to drill a new crop a few weeks later.

It's true that if you spray-off a lawn, then weeds come back first, but it's not because the soil's toxic, just that the weeds spread by a different mechanism to grass.

Rake it all over, and sow some more grass (with something to fire it up a bit as well), I would.

Of course, it might not be glyphosate they're using.

Cheers,

Will

[david lang]

Most local authorities have an official complaints proceedure under their ISO9000 policy - once started has to be completed.

Go for it - they caused the damage - they should put it right.

Dave

[Mr Fizzion]

While cutting the grass verge, the council dented my father's car with their mowing machine. He eventually got compensation about 6 months later without involving any lawyers. They'll probably pay up but it might take some time!

Mr F.

[jg.campbell.ng]

As someone said, it might not be glyphosphate; if I was weedkilling paths, I'd use 'Pathclear'; that kills growing plants and also does something to the soild that inhibits seed germination. Used to use symazine (sp.?) as an active ingredient.

Best regards,

Jon C.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Well, I've phoned and asked what it was, and I'm waiting for a call back, which didn't happen today. They'll be getting a reminder call tomorrow.

[AJH]

You could ask to see the pesticide application records and certificates of competence of their operators, overspray would mean they have not followed the rules. These are legal requirements under the Food and protection of the environment act.

AJH

[RichardS]

Dunno about that. I was either listening to GQT or watching GW a week or so ago & they said it was the perfect time to sow grass seed or patch up lawns with it.

I found a bag of grass seed whilst I was clearing up the shed about a week and a half ago and liberally sprinkled it over the bare patch of "lawn" in "the dead corner" and it's all coming up nicely now. The rain that we apparently had whilst I was away helped...

Something a bit odd there if it was glyphosate - it only kills stuff on contact & the point is that the area can be resown very quickly afterwards. Rake the affected area out very thoroughly though to remove any dead matter.

They could have sprayed with something else, but I'd have thought that the low toxicity of glyphosate based products would have made them a prime contender for spraying in public areas.