Naptime DIY: Apply pre-emergent to your lawn

Every early spring my lawn is a multi-colored mess of dandelions, chickweeds, crab grass and other malcontents that dominate the space for three to four weeks.  Because the Bermuda grass in our yard is established it will choke out the weeds once spring finally finds its groove.  I know that all you have to do is to apply some pre-emergent and it will help contain and possibly prevent crabgrass from rearing its head.  Here is what we’ve learned from our research and practical application.

The final straw came when the umpteenth yard company knocked on our front door to ask if we wanted the annual maintenance plan.  For us the weeds aren’t a big enough nuisance to warrant multiple hundreds of dollars a year. That’s certainly the simplest, but it’s a factor of time, value and money for us.

All you have to do in order to get a handle on crabgrass and other lawn weeds is to apply the pre-emergent twice a year.  At the very beginning of the lawn season and at the beginning of fall, that’s all it takes.  The actual practice of putting it down, because we’re all busy can seem like a major chore.

For us the biggest time factor in laying down pre-emergent was going to the store to get it.  And part of that time was taken up by our children who wanted to run up and down the aisles, look at the power tools (OK that was me) and recommend what trees we should plant next.

At home, when the kids were inside watching Octonauts, I simply put the pre-emergent into our lawn spreader and walked up and down the yard.  I was back inside before they got to the Creature Report and did their little dance number.

The biggest issue about putting down pre-emergent is finding the correct time to do it for your lawn.  That time will vary, our time in Georgia will be different than yours in Illinois.  You need to put it down before the weeds germinate.  We were also told that you don’t want to put it down just before rain.

What I don’t know is how the pre-emergent will act if a warm couple of days made the weed pop, but then were subjected to weeks on end of below normal cold weather.  That was our situation; I noticed a dandelion or two in early February, laid the pre-emergent and got socked into weeks of cold weather.

I think that the germination process would terminate the weeds, killing what was there and that new weeds would come up and take their place.   Such is the nature of a weed.

In late April, when our lawn has normally been rampant with clusters of various weeds I’ll know if that theory holds true.  Regardless, to apply pre-emergent on your lawn is an extremely simple naptime DIY that you can do in about 10 minutes.  Be certain that all kids and pets are inside when you spread it out, read the instructions on the bag and ask at your home improvement store for any tips or suggestions too.