How to Identify and Kill Broadleaf Weeds

Broadleaf weed identification is relatively simple because they stick out like a sore thumb. The leaves look nothing like grass, and although some of their flowers look pretty, these weeds can quickly turn a great yard into a graveyard. Here’s what you need to know for quick broadleaf weed identification:

Step 1: Check the Leaf Shape

Examine the broadleaf weeds in your lawn and compare the leaves’ shapes to the broadleaf weed pictures in the images below. To determine what species you’re dealing with, evaluate the edges of the leaf blade (margins) to see if they’re serrated (toothed), rounded (lobed), or another shape.

Step 2: Analyze the Plant’s Characteristics

Each broadleaf plant’s structure has distinguishing characteristics, ranging from the weed’s growth patterns and habits to the way its leaves are arranged.

Step 3: Look at the Additional Information

Each plant is unique, so if you’re still having trouble pinpointing your problem, go through the individual detail pages on each type of broadleaf weed.

The path to controlling broadleaf weeds in your lawn begins with understanding their life cycles. Depending on whether you’re dealing with annuals, biennials or perennials, you may need to take a different approach to take back your yard.

Here’s how they differ:

• Annual weeds live for only one season and are typically easy to control because they lack the complex underground structures needed to spread new plant growth through creeping roots. Still, annuals produce tons of seeds that can infest and dominate your yard under the right conditions.
• Summer annuals begin to grow in the spring, mature in the summer, and then produce seeds and die by the fall or first hard frost—an entire life cycle completed within 12 months.
• Winter annuals overlap two calendar years but last only 12 months total. They germinate and develop from late summer to early fall, remain semi dormant during the winter and then flower in spring. Come late spring or early summer, they mature and die off as the weather warms.
• Perennial weeds can germinate and spread from seeds, but they also produce a root structure that can birth new weeds from your lawn’s surface or from underground.
• Biennial weeds generally live for two years. The first year consists of leaves, stems and root growth, followed by winter dormancy. In the second year, biennials flower and produce seeds, completing their life cycles.

The best way to prevent a broadleaf weed invasion is to keep your lawn so dense and healthy they never grow at all, but if these weeds are already cropping up, here’s how to control them.

Defending With Lawn Health

The most effective weed control is a flourishing lawn because it’s more competitive and will crowd out broadleaf weeds. To keep your lawn lush, healthy and competitive, try:

• Fertilization: The right type and application method makes all the difference.
• Mowing: Done frequently at the recommended height with sharpened blades.
• Watering: When rainfall is scarce, water deeper rather than more frequently.
• Grass Selection: Factor in climate, sunlight, shade, etc., to pick the right turf grass.

Pulling Weeds

Hand-pulling broadleaf weeds can work if there are only a few, especially if they’re annuals. Perennial weeds are harder to control by hand because you don’t always pull up the vegetative structure that sprouts new weeds.

Herbicide Selectivity

Selective herbicides work on specific plants while causing little to no harm to other plant types—e.g., controlling only broadleaf weeds while not harming your lawn. Non-selective herbicides damage a large range of plants, including lawn grasses, so they’re typically used to clear landscape beds or all vegetation. TruGreen® uses a selective systemic broadleaf weed killer as part of our weed control program for your lawn, which ensures the product moves throughout the weed, killing it completely, root and all. Depending on variables such as weed type and time of year, some weeds may require multiple applications.