Seedlings And Small Plants
- Plant prolifically. Thistle seedlings germinate in empty, unshaded soil. Pulling them may leave a portion of root behind, which will re-sprout in time. In your flower or vegetable garden, plant densely around the thistle. As your chosen plants mature, their shade ultimately weakens and kills the sun-loving baby thistle weeds.
- Cover it. Mulch eliminates thistle seed germination and smothers new plants. Use it around new plants as they gain size, and cover vacant soil.
- Snip smart. In lawns, snip small thistle at the soil level. While mowing prevents it from maturing, it does not kill it. Snipping must be done regularly to eventually weaken and kill the small plant.
Fertilise Your Lawn At Least Once A Year
Grass consumes nutrients from the soil and uses them to produce food and grow. Primarily Nitrogen, Potassium and Phosphate.
Every time you cut the grass you take some of these nutrients away. So, its a good idea to top them back up every so often.
You can buy all kinds of fertilisers which can be applied at different times of the year. The type of lawn you have and your willingness to spend time and money will dictate what type and how often you fertilise your lawn.
That said, apply a good quality, slow-release fertiliser at least once a year. It wont break the bank, its easy to do and your lawn will look a lot better than if you didnt.
How Do You Get Rid Of Thistles Without Chemicals
How to Kill Thistles Organically, Without Chemicals
Don’t Miss: Patio Furniture Rooms To Go
What Is Yellow Nutsedge
Nutsedge is a perennial weed that comes in different colors, with yellow nutsedge being the most common in the USA.
Classed as a noxious weed, its important to treat and remove this plant immediately if you see it growing in your garden, otherwise, it can do serious damage to surrounding wildlife and plant life.
Good To Know How Thistle Grows
That innocent-looking thistle flower matures into a seed-producing machine. Each can produce between 1,500 and 5,000 seeds that take wind and populate. Once seeds land in your lawn or garden and germinate, they send out spreading roots , which can extend up to 20 feet away from the plant, and many feet deep, in the right conditions.
Just spotted thistle blooms in your yard? Remove the flowers immediately, bag them, and place them in the trash. DO NOT compost! Also: Dry, open and uncovered soil is like a thistle welcome mat. Consider laying down a weed barrier or mulch to slam the door on new infestations.
Also Check: How To Adjust Andersen Sliding Patio Door
Occasionally Use Fertilizer On Your Lawn
You dont have to use fertilizer very often once a year is good enough. However, you should use fertilizer sometimes rather than not at all. Not bothering with fertilizer makes it easier for weeds to grow.
Nutrients can help prevent thistles and other weeds from growing on your lawn. Without sufficient nutrients, the grass wont grow well, which leaves room for thistles. Thistles and other weeds can tolerate a lack of nutrients.
Aerating Your Lawn Can Work Wonders
Walking on your lawn is bad for grass and good for weeds. It compacts the soil and prevents air, water, and nutrients from reaching into the ground. If the conditions in the soil are poor, grass cannot grow, but thistles still can.
Invest in an aerator even a cheap, manual one and use it occasionally. It works best if you take the time to cover your whole lawn and not merely where you have a problem with weeds. Again, anything that is good for grass growth is bad for weeds.
Recommended Reading: Screen Porch Door With Dog Door
How To Get Rid Of Thistle
Although stubborn, the thistle isnt some mystical plant that simply cant be destroyed. There are a few tactics you can try to get your thistle problem under wraps if you find the noxious weed is taking over your lawn.
- Manual weeding: If you like to pull weeds by hand, theres an art to removing thistle you need to know about. Snip the plant at the soil level and avoid mowing it, and when youre ready, dig out the roots with a sharp weeding tool. Be prepared to hunt for the roots as they can travel exceptionally far in this plant.
- Harsh herbicides: Some people like to come out guns blazing when dealing with thistles, and certain selective herbicides are ideal. Be mindful when applying these that theyre toxic chemicals and arent safe around pets and children.
- Natural herbicides: Those who prefer a natural approach might find creating their own herbicide to be effective. Household products like dish soap and vinegar are great at treating weeds and thistles hate the acetic acid content of this formula. Apply once a week regularly until you start seeing a difference.
- : Theres nothing wrong with admitting defeat when it comes to weed, and especially one as stubborn as thistle. If youve tried all of the other methods and find that you still cant get this weed under control, calling a landscaping professional who has experience with the plant is your next best option.
An Annoying Invasive Weed
Canada thistle can be difficult to get rid of, however, with the right process, you can successfully eliminate it from your yard and garden. Since it is an invasive species, not native to North America, it is always best to get rid of it when possible.
Though it will take time and patience, following these steps can help eliminate and manage thistle plants:
- Herbicide
- Salt and Vinegar
Please comment if you enjoyed this article or have any questions or remarks regarding eliminating Canada thistle!
amzn_assoc_placement = adunit0
Don’t Miss: How To Install A Pergola On A Paver Patio
How To Remove Thistle Weeds From Your Lawn
Although recognised as the national flower of Scotland, thistles are in fact considered weeds in most parts of Australia. Like most broadleaf weeds, they present a problem for your home lawn, competing with grass varieties for nutrients, water, and sunlight. As well as being unsightly, thistles are commonly considered noxious weeds by many local councils, which means landowners have a responsibility to eliminate them from their properties.
In this article, we look at some of the best management approaches for banishing thistle weeds from your lawn.
Dig Thistle Weeds Out:
When the thistle matures, it spreads rough roots alongside your lawn. Eventually, new plants start to germinate and grow. Day by Day it goes out of control and becomes tricky to weed out. You should eliminate the larger plants. For doing so, you can use a thistle removal tool to dig the soil. Try to remove all roots by digging the soil as best you can. Using a weed-out lawn weeding tool is a super essay method to get rid of thistle weeds.
Recommended Reading: How To Do Overseed Your Lawn
Read Also: How To Keep Patio Furniture Cushions In Place
Uprooting Thistles Doesnt Always Work
Sometimes, putting on gloves and uprooting thistles by hand is a quick, simple, effective, and free way to get rid of them. If you are dealing with creeping or dwarf thistles, you can uproot them by hand and kill them.
However, many other thistles can easily grow back even if you do your best to remove them completely. Even if you use a weeder tool, some species of thistle will still recover. It takes herbicides to kill the hardier species of thistles.
Managing Thistle Growing Between Landscape Plants
If you are trying to manage Canadian Thistles in landscape areas that have desirable plants, you will need to use a selective herbicide. There are some products that work great on thistles but wont harm the majority of woody ornamental plants. This means it is possible to kill thistles in a bed of junipers or other groundcover if they are emerging, which is a task that hand-pulling would never accomplish effectively. Consult with a landscaping company that offers vegetation management services who will know what plants are able to handle these herbicides without any injury to desirable species.
No matter what your situation with thistles is, you will need to treat these areas many times throughout the growing season. Some areas will require 4-7 applications of herbicides throughout the year and even may warrant a few hand-pulling projects after weeds are wilted down and brown.
If you have problems with thistles in your landscape and would like to know the options for their control, please contact us.
Receive special promos and offers
Also Check: When To Fertilize Lawn In Arkansas
Read Also: Broward County Fence And Pergola
What Is Thistle Weed
Thistle Weed is a common, sometimes flowery, weed with both invasive and native species. While beneficial to fauna, these prickly nuisances are best left to flourish in wilderness areas where they thrive without damaging lawns or harming individuals. They can take over properties quickly when not managed, and bring both allergic reactions and pain to humans and pets.
Though theyre relatives of the daisy family, theyre hardly deserving of such a friendly title. Many states have classified thistle as noxious weeds plants posing enough risk to the health of native flora and fauna to require significant control through government action.
Thistles that go to seed can produce as many as 5,000 seeds a piece that, like dandelions, use the wind to blow and repopulate. Difficult to eradicate, thistle seeds are capable of surviving underground for 16 years, and sometimes more.
Thistles are also great opportunists, hardy enough to grow everywhere from fields and pastures to driveway cracks and backyards. While thistle is good to find in the great outdoors, the answer to the question, Is thistle a weed? is usually a resounding, Yes!.
Create A Basic Weed Killing Formula
Now, its obvious that you wont just have to deal with Bull Thistle all the time. There are going to be times where you will be confronted with the pesky problem of the Canada thistle. The Canada thistle has a considerably more complex root system as compared to its biennial counterpart.
Importantly, due to the complicated design, you need to make sure that you remove the thistle as efficiently as you can, but this wont be possible if you try to do it by hand. No, its much more efficient if you make use of a weed killer to get rid of the problem.
One of the best ways to get rid of a weed infestation in your garden is to make use of acetic acid. Theres no need for you to go out and buy the acid yourself you will probably have quite a store of acetic acid available in your pantry already. In the simplest of terms, acetic acid is just your old-fashioned vinegar.
Acetic acid is widely regarded as a potent poison ivy killer, and its completely organic. Its able to kill weeds directly on impact, especially when you combine it with other ingredients, such as salt or dish soap.
Now, while highly concentrated vinegar is going to do an excellent job, you should know that conventional vinegar will work just as well. You can also find horticultural vinegar in the market, which contains around 20% acetic acid.
But, you need to know that this is not an overnight process. You will have to spray the weed at least once a week until it completely dries out.
You May Like: How Much To Do A Paver Patio
Homemade Thistle Killer Using Gin
This might come as a surprise to most people, but gin can actually be an effective tool for combating a thistle infestation.
Thistle doesnt just spread with the seeds from their flowers, but they also spread through rhizomes. Rhizomes are the roots that run underneath the ground, and one of the best ways to deal with this problem is to create a gin spray that directly attacks the weeds at their roots.
This will stop the ability of the plant to spread via the roots, and you wont have much to worry about! To make a gin-based thistle killer, you are going to need at least two ounces of gin, and one ounce of apple cider vinegar. Mix the two together, and then add one tablespoon of liquid-based dish soap. Finally, pour in a quart of water, and you are good to go.
Make sure you shake the solution carefully and mix it properly before usage. Apart from being one of the best weapons for killing the root system of the thistle and various other kinds of unwanted weeds, you should know that this recipe is also suitable for getting rid of all other kinds of weeds as well.
Once you treat a particular area with this solution, getting rid of the weeds isnt going to be a problem. Again, its also important that you take preventative measures to ensure that thistle doesnt grow in the same place again. This involves making sure that you mow the area properly and prevent the thistle from developing.
Are They Dangerous In The Garden
As well as being toxic to animals, people, and other plants, thistle is a major pain to get rid of.
Even savvy gardeners struggle sometimes to get a thistle invasion out of control and find they have to call in expert help just to remove them.
What makes thistle such a force to be reckoned with is the ease with which it spreads, and even removing their flowers requires care to not spread the seeds any further.
Although its easier to remove them in the seedling and small plant stage, you can still get rid of thistles when theyre fully grown, if you know what youre doing.
Also Check: What Are The Different Types Of Patios
How Bamboo Weeds Spread
Bamboo that spreads in clumps is slow to spread. While it may have a huge root system, it can be dug up. Running bamboo spreads by runners and is often invasive and hard to control. Its runners or rhizomes can spread more than 100 feet from the original plant. You can learn more about Good and Bad Bamboo.
How To Prevent Thistle
Thistle spreads quickly once it turns into a seed, so if you are removing thistles by hand make sure you do so long before the flower has changed. Thistle seed can also bury itself deeply, so aerating and seeding as much as possible will prevent thistle from receiving enough nutrients to grow.
Thistle that is removed before it has an opportunity to spread may not sprout new broadleaf weeds. But once it has started spreading you are going to need some type of application to remove it from your lawn. Contact Green Lawn Fertilizing today to learn more about our green lawn and broadleaf weed removal services.
You May Like: How Much Is It To Build A Patio Cover
How Do I Get Rid Of Thistles In My Lawn
QuestionWe have a lot of thistles growing in our lawn. What is the best way to get rid of them?
Answer from a Zamzows Lawn ExpertThanks for the question. Getting rid of thistle is not an easy task. It will require perseverance on your part, and a great weed killer. You will need two products to get rid of the thistle in your lawn. The first product is Zamzows Ultra Weed Control for Lawns. It is a great selective , weed killer that works at temperatures above 45 degrees. The second product is a spreader sticker called StayPut. This product supercharges the weed killer and increases its effectiveness 30%. Without using StayPut, your chances of eradicating the thistle will dramatically decrease.
Pick a nice sunny day, and apply these products, and you will see the thistle slowly die off. You may have to reapply, even a few times to get total control, but if you use these products, your thistle will go away eventually.
Also Check: How To Get The Greenest Thickest Lawn
How To Get Rid Of Canadian Thistle In Lawn
How to get rid of canadian thistle in lawn? To get rid of thistle with salt and vinegar, fill up a spray bottle with vinegar and do not dilute it. Cut the stem of the thistle and spray the vinegar directly on it, while avoiding getting the soil. Then sprinkle a pinch of salt at the base of the plant, as it will dehydrate the thistle.
What will kill thistles but not grass? A homemade herbicide consisting of vinegar and salt may be effective at killing unwanted thistle plants. The vinegar needs to contain at least 20 percent acetic acid to be effective at killing weeds.
How do I kill Canadian thistle in my lawn? Canada thistle can be killed with weed killers. The best time to apply these is on sunny days when the temperatures are between 65 and 85 degrees F. . Since many weed killers are non-selective, they will kill anything they touch, so it is best not to use these on windy days.
How do you stop Canada thistle from spreading? Mid-May to mid-June Herbicide treatments containing clopyralid, aminopyralid or glyphosate when the plant is in bud to flower stage can be effective for reduction of the population. Alternatively, mechanically cut Canada thistle prior to flowering with a rotary mower set at the highest height.
Don’t Miss: How To Hang Lights On Aluminum Patio