# PGR Growth / Nutsedge



## Christech11 (Mar 26, 2019)

I just returned home from a recent trip to TX and was looking forward to seeing some growth on my yard since I haven't mowed in 10 days. I pull up to my house this evening and I've maybe had a 1/4" to 3/8" of an inch of verticle growth. I applied T-Nex a total of 2 applications this year with the last one coming on 5/31 at the rate of .4oz per K. Am I overapplying with this type of growth? The stem/stalk is also super thick and brown. Bermuda is 419 based on several local opinions. 



My nutsedge is thriving, however, and this has been an ongoing battle for the last 3 seasons. I've used Q4+ (mostly for crabgrass) and spot sprayed both Dismiss and Image with results but it still continues to come back. Should I do a blanket app to knock these down? Am I missing a miracle product that will take care of the outbreak with an application or two? Sorry for the pics as the sun was down.


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## Lawn_newbie (Jun 19, 2018)

I am with you on the nutsedge. I have applied Dismiss and Sedgehammer for three years and I still have nutsedge again this year.


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## Jordan90 (Apr 7, 2019)

I tap to nutsedge. I just treat it as it pops up.


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## Mightyquinn (Jan 31, 2017)

I'm a fan of Certainty for sedges, it seems to knock them out fairly quickly and easily and there are no temperature restriction on it either.


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## FlowRider (Apr 7, 2019)

I have had my yard absolutely covered up with Nutsedge when I recovered from knee surgery and fired my lawn mower operators and spray & pray fert & squirt lawn spray company. Utterly covered up in the stuff, it was literally everywhere....

I started off buying a hose end sprayer of Ortho for Nutsedge at Lowe's or Home Depot - not sure which now. It actually worked, or so I thought. I had purchased four bottles, so when the second flush of foliage came back, I hit it again. The advantage of the hose end sprayer was it was a blanket treatment, and it not only hit the blades but soaked into the soil.

Of course, I had only limited knowledge of how to deal with it, and like most homeowner consumers, only big box store options available, until I started doing more homework to find out what the professionals use.

I also used Image after that, for the third round of growth. It gave me pretty good results, and I was able to kill most of it off.

As I understand it, nutsedge has nutlets, or tubers, underneath in the soil, which store its food energy (I assume starch made into sugar, or maybe it is vice versa - I am no expert still). So, when you blanket spray it, you kill the first blades you see at the surface, and some herbicide enters the plant via translocation, and some hits the rhizomes (root system, which in nutsedge is extensive), and some hit the tubers. The research I read said the plant uses up about 40% of its stored energy reserves when it pushes up the first blades you see.

Then you burn that down, and it sends up a second flush of new growth, again using 40% of the stored energy, and you kill that off. But that nutlet still has 20% of its stored food energy left, and it will take a third spraying to get that last bit killed.

So when I used Image for the third application, it effectively eliminated about 90% of the nutsedge in my yard. I should also add I have yellow nutsedge, which is easier to kill than the purple nutsedge, again, as I understand the research.

That pretty much ended the first growing season, so I waited to see if nutsedge was going to return this season. Well, it did, but instead of being everywhere in the lawn, it was grouped in certain areas of the yards, what I call pockets of weeds.

So I figured out there had to be a better solution than big box store hose end sprayers, and I decided to learn what was needed to really get these weeds and sedges under control. So down the rabbit hole I went, and I ended up on this forum.

So I had bought some more Image during the winter to get ready for this spring season at Tractor Supply, which is more like a little box store, I guess, and I also found some Q4 Plus on my first visit to Site One, as I began to get more serious.

Then I read the "Bermuda Bible" authored by Mighty Quinn (I put it into quotes because my dear departed grandmother would get on me about blasphemy if she was still alive, out of respect for her in my memories...) and went to Site One....

So I bought Certainty and Celsius, and non-ionic surfactant, and marker dye, and eventually some methylated seed oil, and then I bought a decent residential tow behind sprayer and started getting geared up to lay waste to these weeds.

I still had the leftover herbicides from the big box stores and my new Q4 Plus bottle, so I used them up first. I still have my bottle of Image, for round three this season, and two gallons of Q4 for the problem areas (pockets) to blanket spray in the pocket areas. You have to hit the blades, the rhizomes (root system), and the tubers to finish the fight on this dang weed.

And I think it will try again next season. As I understand it, it takes three growing seasons to get the nutlets killed off....

Next I am switching to Certainty, primarily because the people on this web site with much more expertise and experience recommended it, and like @Mightyquinn says, there are no temperature limitations in using it, which is all summer long in Texas....

The key point that I think is most important about nutsedge treatment is the three applications to kill the foliage, the fibrous root system or rhizomes, which both feed the nutlets, and then kill the nutlets by also treating the soil itself.

This is why I incorporated the teachings of @Greendoc into the plans to kill nutsedge in my lawn, when he emphasized the importance of blanket spraying to kill nutsedge - you have to spray the blades, roots, and tubers, and to do that, you have to resort to blanket spraying in the areas where you have this invasive weed infestation to deal with.

Anyway, that is my plan of action for this season. So far, through round two, I am killing the yellow nutsedge in this manner. Once I make the switch to Certainty, I think I will be able to keep it under control as far as it can be under control.

And at the end of the day, that is what I was after. Weeds have always won the war; but I am going to win as many of the battles in that war as I can, on my land.

It is all part of The Process. By "The Process" I mean gaining ground every day or every week to get my lawn healthy again.


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## Bunnysarefat (May 4, 2017)

.4oz is a pretty stout dose. I know the lower you are mowing the higher dose you need so you have to take that into consideration. Don't know if you did but I learned not to use a surfactant with PGR as it burned up a bunch of my grass with a moderate dose.

With nutsedge, for about a year I would just mix up a really small Dixie cup size concoction with DMSO, sedgehammer, and blue marking dye and paint all the nutsedge about once a week. Works pretty well. Of course they still show up, but I probably only get 3-4 individual sedges popping up per week this year.


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## FlowRider (Apr 7, 2019)

This short video may help.

His handheld boom setup is interesting...!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SVgbXLP_oKE


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## Jordan90 (Apr 7, 2019)

FlowRider said:


> This short video may help.
> 
> His handheld boom setup is interesting...!


Thanks! Good stuff

Yes that boom is fantastic!


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## Christech11 (Mar 26, 2019)

Thanks for everyone's input and advice! 
@FlowRider @Mightyquinn

I bought a packet of sedgehammer today but I'm thinking that investing in Certainty will be my best route.

@Bunnysarefat I went back and looked at the application rate and you're right on the .4 being a little strong. My yard is under .5" so I'm going to try to cut the application rate in half and see if I don't get a little different results.


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

FlowRider said:


> This short video may help.
> 
> His handheld boom setup is interesting...!


That is the standard spray boom used by weed researchers. Rather spendy. Uses aluminum tubing so it is fragile. I use a hand held boom made of PVC pipe. So if the pipe gets damaged, a trip to Lowes or my irrigation vendor has me back in action quick


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## dwills02 (Aug 1, 2018)

Is there a temp restriction on Sedgehammer?


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## Durso81 (Apr 10, 2018)

Here are some good videos on nutsedge from the @thegrassfactor


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

dwills02 said:


> Is there a temp restriction on Sedgehammer?


No


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