Lespedeza is a vile weed. I had a hard time identifying what it is. It seems to have taken over my neighborhood. It's choking out the healthy fescue grass. Do you have a problem with this weed where you live? How do you get rid of it?

This is the best I could find:

Lespedeza Identification and Control in Turfgrass

http://extension.uga.edu/publi...rol%20in%20Turfgrass

Q4 plus.

https://www.domyown.com/q4-plu...e-p-1930.html?page=2

Dang, I thought this thread was gonna be about some guy named Lespedeza.

Had it in NC, locals call it "spurge", Trimec took care of it in centapede grass and Bermuda. I actually sprayed my neighbors yard too, to keep it from coming back.

AND HE DON'T PAY HIS TAXES!!

BOLO for Trimec and Lespedeza in a lowered Cutlass near the bodega.

Native lespedeza is beneficial to wildlife here in the Southeast, especially important to Bobwhite quail. The problem is with Asian lespedeza that has been introduced, some of which has no feed value to wildlife. It is a woody plant and we have had good luck in our pastures and hay fields with Remedy Ultra on woody plants but be really careful around desirable trees and shrubs using any of the woody plant herbicides.

quote:

Originally posted by wcb6092:
Q4 plus.

Q4 Plus Turf Herbicide
$46.25 a quart? Dang!
... and that's before the taxes!

quote:

Native lespedeza is beneficial to wildlife here in the Southeast, especially important to Bobwhite quail.

That's all fine and dandy. I like the quail. But they can have it.

When I went to the Missouri extension, they actually tell you how to grow the stuff.
I just want it out of my yard!

Annual Lespedeza
Lespedeza is good pasture for dairy heifers but, when mature, can cause problems in lactating dairy cows. Dairy producers note that grazing lespedeza after it is in bloom decreases milk production.

Lespedeza can be grown with all of the adapted cool-season grasses but performs best with orchardgrass. Early Missouri grazing trials reported more pounds of beef from lespedeza-orchardgrass than from lespedeza-fescue (endophyte level unknown).

Lespedeza can be rotated with small grains if N applications do not exceed 20 to 30 pounds per acre. Grazing the small grain closely in the spring will help lespedeza survive applications of N.

Lespedeza has an added value where quail production is important because annual lespedeza seed is an excellent quail food.

Hay yield and quality
Lespedeza will produce less forage per acre than properly managed alfalfa or clover but can be maintained with lower production costs.
https://extension2.missouri.edu/g4515

We just sold our house. That yard had been taken over by torpedo grass. Another vile weed.

The rental we just moved in to is brand new 2017 build. Lespedeza is growing, the centipede grass is struggling.

I’m about to start building our new house. I wonder what kind of vile weed I’ll introduce to it. With my horticultural abilities, probably both.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Dang, I thought this thread was gonna be about some guy named Lespedeza.

I had never encountered this until this year. We built our house last year and this stuff has been popping up since Spring. I have just been pulling out of the ground as I find it.

I thought this was going to be two women biking in the zoo. Or S. America.

Also, a product called "Crossbow" killed it, and didn't hurt the grass-but the local guy in NC said not to use it on centipede as is was finicky and the crossbow could hurt it.

I got both chemicals at a place called Cardinal Chemicals...they sold checms to farmers and golf courses . There may be a local Chemical company that sells near you. For example

Lowes had Round up in the quart bottle concentrate for $40, Cardinal had it in a 2 1/2 gallon concentrate for $40.

try looking where the local farmers get their stuff

Is it poisonous or does it have cruel thorns on it?

already alluded to, but I've seen MANY wildlife mixes that have this in them. Some DOT and other organizations specify to include this in reseeding mixes on purpose.

Apparenlty half the people are planting it on purpose and the other half are spraying it as a weed....

My whole yard is moss, wild violets, mixed native grass, dandelions, green onions, clover, etc. I don't think I have any fescue, bermuda, etc.

It's all green stuff that grows and I cut it every now and then. Why fight nature ?

This shit grows with impunity in my flower beds and the cracks in the driveway. The yard is not victim tho due to my "better living through chemical engineering approach".

The only thing that eradicated it on the side of my driveway was the St. John's Wort plants muscling it out.

Well, you could introduce Kudzu to the affected area. Kudzu would probably cover up the Lespedeza in about a week...

quote:

Originally posted by SBrooks:
My whole yard is moss, wild violets, mixed native grass, dandelions, green onions, clover, etc. I don't think I have any fescue, bermuda, etc.

It's all green stuff that grows and I cut it every now and then. Why fight nature ?

That used to be my attitude. Then I retied. Now I have time

So far it's been Speedzone for the excess clover (except in the very back, where I left a bunch of it for the honeybees) and Creeping Charlie, and Weed B Gone for the crabgrass. Waitin' for a callback from my landscape supply's "chemicals guy" to ask him about Tenacity for the Nimblewill (aka: Nimbleweed).

Got some wild violet going on, too. But little enough to control by pulling by hand.

Now that's it's cooled-off a little, I'm going to start hand dethatching in preparation for overseeding in a little while.

Guy called back. Ok, forget the Tenacity. $117 for 8 oz.! It'll last forever, but, still...

It is a plague here. The farmer who leases my land for hay spent lots of monet and time peparing my fields for fescue 15 years ago.

Now those fields are 70% lespederza, his cows eat it as hay, but not they don't really want it. He has sprayed all the fields several times, and cannot eradicate it. Growing up, I never saw ithere, after the Highway Dept started using it in their seeding and reseeding on road work, it showed up everywhere and spreads like crazy.