Tim’s Tips – Mid-March
Now is a good time to go after cool season weeds in your beds, mainly Henbit and Chickweed. These weeds can take over bare spots of ground. In the warm season, these weeds will die then reappear in the fall.
You can remove weeds by mechanical means such as a garden hoe, or use a chemical. Non-chemical treatments of weeds can work but sometimes are not practical considering the labor needed to treat the area affected. I recommend Roundup Pro because it includes a surfactant that helps the herbicide stick to the weed. You can mix an herbicide using Dawn as surfactant also.
Moles in your lawn are slowed down by pre-emergent herbicides and fertilizer. They don’t like the smell and the chemical odors will deter their mating for awhile. Moles have a very keen sense of smell. For a more permanent mole solution I recommend spring-loaded mole traps.
Milorganite fertilizer has a bonus effect – the smell repels rabbits and deer for awhile.
You can probably reseed lawns earlier than normal this year but it’s still a little early. Wait until the ground temperature is 50 degrees or above through the night. If you have no choice but to seed now, use a rye grass. If you have used any pre-emergent herbicide, wait three weeks to seed or your seed may not come up.
The intermittent warm temperatures may tempt you to accelerate some spring tasks but you still have to be vigilant about the possibility of more freezing temperatures.
Keep an eye out for plants that did not survive the dry winter or have salt damage.