By Dan Gill, LSU AgCenter
With the warm weather, homeowners are anxious to fertilize their St. Augustine grass and centipede grass lawns as well as get weed and feed out to control weeds.
However, it is not time to put either conventional lawn fertilizer or weed and feed fertilizer out right now. Fertilizing this early with high nitrogen lawn fertilizer or weed and feed can contribute to a late winter kill due to a late freeze or bring on brown patch disease. The best time to apply weed and feed in St. Augustine grass and centipede grass is late March. Weed and feeds are not always the most effective weed killers but they are definitely the most convenient and no doubt homeowners like to use weed and feed products like Scotts Bonus S (atrazine) or some type of granular “Trimec” herbicide (2,4-D, dicamba, mecoprop) for their winter weed problems in the spring. If using a weed and feed that contains atrazine, it should be applied to a dry lawn but watered in soon after the application.
Atrazine works mainly through root uptake so watering after spreading gets the herbicide into the root zone. If using a weed and feed that contains Trimec, it should be applied when there is a heavy dew or after the lawn has been irrigated. The granules need to stick to the weeds for the herbicide to work with “Trimec” type weed and feeds. Be advised that the labeling for both weed and feed type products, either atrazine or Trimec, will tell you to stay away from the dripline/root zone of trees, shrubs and landscape beds.
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