With spring upon us, it may seem like the perfect time to get outside and start preparing your lawn. But be cautious. Fertilizer applied too early to a lawn can create disease problems and winter damage. Warm-season grasses such as Bermuda, St. Augustine and zoysia should not be fertilized until the beginning of May while centipede should not be fertilized until June.
Using a soil test which can be found at your local extension office will provide you with fertilizer recommendations and rates. The test will also provide you with the pH of your soil and lime recommendations. If you have not completed a soil test, baseline fertilizer rates and recommendations can be found on our turf website, turffiles.ncsu.edu.
Weed-and-feed products may sound reasonable enough. They advertise the ability to fertilize your lawn while providing weed control, but these products do not work well for warm-season grasses. Warm-season grasses are still dormant this time of year and applying fertilizer with nitrogen right now will be a waste of time, money and create potential runoff problems. Several weed-and-feed products usually contain 2,4-D as an active ingredient. 2,4-D should be applied at a reduced rate on St. Augustine and centipede when it is coming out of dormancy to prevent damage to these lawns. These products can also cause early greening of grass that will become damaged by disease or freezing temperatures.
Winter broadleaf weeds including chickweed, dandelions, henbit and Carolina geranium can be controlled in warm-season lawns with broadleaf herbicides. These broadleaf herbicides are usually called three-way herbicides because they contain three active ingredients: 2,4-D, mecoprop and dicamba. Two applications two weeks apart may be needed for best control. As previously mentioned, only use products containing 2,4-D on centipede and St. Augustine before it has greened-up because these lawns can be stunted by this ingredient. If centipede or St. Augustine grass is not in dormancy, 2,4-D can be applied at half the recommended rate. Always consult and follow the product label before applying.
For more information on spring lawn care and weed control, contact the Pitt County Master Gardeners at 902-1705. Thanks for reading!
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