These Delicate Blooming Plants Can Be A Challenge To Banish From Your Yard Heres How To Rid Your Lawn Of This Pretty Yet Pesky Perennial
There are many types of wild violet species, some native and others European and Asian invaders, but all grow primarily in the northern regions of the U.S. You can recognize these flowering perennials by their early spring blossoms and heart-shaped, waxy leaves. Most commonly the five-petaled flowers are deep purple, but they can also be white, speckled or yellow.
This tenacious little plant might be considered a bothersome weed by some, says expert gardener Em Shipman of KidsGardening.org.But overall, it has many benefits to humans, animals and pollinators. Read on to learn all you need to know about this common weed and how to keep it from taking over your lawn.
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Are Wild Violets Safe To Eat
Wild Violets are in fact safe to eat! Do make sure you correctly identify any and all plants that you forage before eating them. Violets are often used as a garnish on wedding cakes or in other desserts. Flowers can be crystallized with sugar or used on their own. Violet jelly, liquor, syrup, vinegar and tea are all common uses. Leaves and flowers together are often consumed on salads. Leaves can also be added to soups or stews. Violets provide both vitamins A and C.
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A Closer Look At Ground Ivy Weeds
Like violets, ground ivy, which is also sometimes referred to as creeping Charlie, is incredibly aggressive. It grows in thick mats in areas of your lawn and can quickly become a major problem. Ground ivy can form extensive patches as it creeps across your lawn, crowding out desired turfgrass in the process. As it creeps along the soil surface it will form roots where its leaves join its stems.
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Dont Let Violets Overtake Your Lawn Call Farison Lawn Care
Violets are tricky, but proper lawn maintenance with Farison Lawn Care can help. A comprehensive lawn care program with weed control applications such as the one that Farison offers can help keep your lawn healthy and better able to ward off weed infestations. Call or contact us online to schedule a lawn maintenance program today! For more tips and ideas on maintaining a gorgeous lawn, be sure to visit our monthly blog and follow us on , , or !
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Cleat Tips To Get Rid Of Wild Violets In Your Lawn
Wild violets are a near relative of violas, pansies, and other garden flowers. Even though some people today see this plant as a good wildflower others regard it as stubborn perennial lawn marijuana. Wild violets could be taken out by hand, particularly if you frequently inspect your yard to restrain the plant until it spreads. But occasionally this marijuana calls for its use of chemical herbicides for complete eradication.
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Pbi/gordon 652400 The Best For Quick Results
Its an effective herbicide on some troublesome grass or weed that does swift work either the weeds die or at least reach a situation where they can no longer recover. This works wonders against dandelions, in particular.
Pros
- Restricted in some states
- Wont kill crabgrass or St. Augustine grass
If you have a large lawn and search for anything to help remove the weeds, this product can be helpful. A region of 14,000 to 18,000 sq. ft. will fill it. It works quickly, so once you use this tool, you can start planning on reseeding your broad lawn in around two weeks.
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How To Get Rid Of Wild Violets
Wild Violets are really hard to get rid of. Hand digging can work if there are just a few clumps, but its tiresome and you must fully remove all rhizomes, which is very hard to do. Fully removing sod and establishing an entirely new yard will definitely work. However, we recommend enjoying the pretty purple pop of color in your yard and the constant green leaves they provide.
Weedkiller is rarely effective on these plants because of their waxy leaves. Some strong chemical-based weed killers that we do not recommend sometimes work, but not always. When attempting chemical control, its best to apply the weedkillers in the Fall when they arent actively growing.
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How To Prevent Wild Violets From Coming Back
Many homeowners let a limited number of wild violets coexist with their turfgrass because the flowers are an important source of nectar when little else is in bloom. But once youve stopped a full-blown invasion, heres how you can keep these plants in check.
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Lawn care best practices: Start with a healthy, well-maintained lawn and planting beds. Dense grass and foliage make it difficult for seeds to establish and roots to spread, Shipman says.
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Mulching: Within a day or two after hand weeding, apply a thick layer of mulch to the area you weeded to suffocate any small bits of plant or root system left in the soil.
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Pruning: Wild violets do best in light shade where turfgrass struggles to thrive. Trim trees and overgrown shrubs to allow more sunlight to hit patches of the lawn where the flowers are proliferating.
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Drainage: Moist soil is where wild violets thrive, so improving the drainage of your garden or lawn will prevent these plants from taking up residence. Aerate your soil or mix in coarse organic material like sawdust, sand or gypsum.
How To Kill Wild Violets Growing In The Yard Without Killing The Grass
21 September, 2017
Wild violet has a reputation of being notoriously hard to kill. But most of that reputation is because of the use of the wrong type of herbicide. Wild violet is only responsive to post-emergent broad leaf herbicides that contains triclopyr and is listed as safe to use on lawns. This type of herbicide is much more effective on wild violets than any other. However, wild violet is stubborn and it will likely take more than one application applied over more than one season to get rid of the plant for good.
Mow your lawn and the wild violet. By cutting the wild violet back, you will force it to start growing rapidly. Perennial weeds like wild violet must be actively growing when sprayed or else the herbicide will not be drawn down into the weeds roots.
- Wild violet has a reputation of being notoriously hard to kill.
- Wild violet is only responsive to post-emergent broad leaf herbicides that contains triclopyr and is listed as safe to use on lawns.
Spray the wild violet once it has grown 3 to 4 inches. Coat all of the plant tissue, but stop just before the herbicide drips off of the plant. In roughly two weeks, most of the wild violet will have wilted and turned yellow.
Spray the wild violet again three weeks after the first application . The second application should kill the majority of this seasons wild violet. If not, spray again as necessary at the intervals specified by your herbicides manufacturer.
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How To Get Rid Of Wild Violets Organically
There are several organic ways to deal will violets on your lawn. Lets have a look at some of them.
1. Tolerating And Living With The Wild Violets
Even though its a crazy idea its by far the simplest and the most cost-effective way to deal with wild violets. All you have to do is try and enhance grass lawn wellbeing to give it a competing chance against the weeds.
Furthermore, not everybody considers these beautiful flowers a weed, and if managed properly, you can live with them peacefully.
2. Removing Wild Violets by Hand
Fresh and young violets flowers are relatively simple to pull out by hand. For older flowers, you can use opt for a garden fork to help you dig them out. However, this will only work on a small area or if the flowers are scattered across the lawn.
Plus, it is not easy to pull out the flowers completely with their roots, meaning they will grow back again after a short while. It is recommended that you follow up this method with a concrete plan to enhance the health of the lawn to help choke out new weeds.
3. Using homemade Wild Violet Weed Killer
You can also use a homemade weed killer mixture to kill violet flowers on your lawn. Mix horticultural vinegar and water and spray the solution directly to the flowering foliage. This homemade herbicide is believed to have an 80% success rate on wild violet.
How Do You Get Rid Of Ground Ivy
As pervasive as wild violets, finding the best weed killer for ground ivy can be a tricky task. While you can pull and pull at these weeds, this is not how to get rid of ivy on the ground, as this persistent growth will just come right on back.
So, how do you get rid of ground ivy effectively? Similar to wild violets, we recommend:
- A liquid broadleaf herbicide
- A long-term treatment plan
- Effective lawn care throughout the year
Like with wild violets, what kills ground ivy is an effective, professional application of broadleaf liquid herbicide. This will require more than one treatment a year, from the spring and into the fall. We also recommend waiting to mow your lawns for three days after treatment to best keep creeping charlie at bay.
Additionally, in order to find what kills creeping charlie but not grass, youâll need to boost your lawn care to strengthen and thicken your lawn. With this process, youâll limit the spread of ground ivy while ensuring you still have grass on your commercial property.
When it comes to the question of how do you kill creeping charlie, the more the better. With this in mind, a technician can spray your lawn with treatments whenever they are there to treat the lawn, creating a better potential for controlling this invasive weed.
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Can Voles Transmit Diseases To People
Voles have been known to carry a variety of diseases like rabies, Hantavirus, and Korean hemorrhagic fever. This makes it especially important to keep a safe distance from them in your yard. Even their feces and urine can carry viruses, so be sure to wear closed-toe shoes and gloves if youre working near their runways.
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Are Wild Violets Weeds
If you define a weed as any plant growing where you dont want it, you can definitely consider wild violets in your lawn to be weeds.
Wild violets freely self-seed, quickly taking over a lawn or planted bed and are not too easy to get rid of, Shipman says. While they have many benefits to pollinators and wildlife, their aggressive habits can make them a headache for gardeners with a more manicured image in mind.
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Wild Violet Species Identification
From the blue to purple flowers they grow to the underground stems that can cause them to aggressively spread throughout your thick and healthy lawn, wild violets are easy to identify. They tend to be most common in the early spring.
In addition to their deep purple color, theyre also characterized by heart-shaped leaves. But these arent pretty flowers. In fact, theyre among the more challenging weeds to kill. Though they favor moist soil, they can also tolerate drought. And the flowers can drop seeds below the low-growing waxy leaves, which can submerge them in lawns and cause them to spread until there are thick clumps of even more violets in your lawn.
The good news is that they can be controlled and prevented both the flowers and the underground root system. In the forthcoming section, well take a look at how to do it:
Controlling Wild Violet Weeds In The Lawn
One of the most difficult weeds to control in the lawn is wild violet. This native plant may look cute and dainty, especially in the spring when it produces pretty purple flowers. But in reality it is an aggressive weed with an unusual flowering quirk that results in thick mats of leaves that can choke out your lawn.
Wild violets are very tough plants that tolerate drought. But the ideal condition for them is moist soil, which this years above average rainfall has provided. This has resulted in vigorous growth and spreading of this weed.
In spring, wild violets produce their well-known purple flowers, which are often mowed off. But in summer violets can produce a different type of self-pollinating flower that stays below the leaves and produces seeds that are dropped in the surrounding area. These flowers will not be mowed off, allowing for a large amount of seeds to be spread. They also spread by underground stems. Using these two methods, they can eventually create dense colonies.
Wild violets can be controlled, but it does take some effort and repeat treatment. Fall is the ideal time to control wild violets as they will more readily move herbicides into the root system as they prepare for winter.
Selective broadleaf weed herbicides must list wild violet on the label to be effective. Bonide Chickweed Clover& Oxalis Killer is an option, or a product containing dicamba and triclopyr, but again it may take several applications to completely eradicate established plants.
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Killing Violets In The Lawn
Getting rid of violets is no easy task. Hand-pulling violets wont get you very far due to their strong roots. Its very difficult to pull a violet without leaving at least some of the root in the ground, meaning its going to grow right back. Granular products dont work well on violets, either. Thats because not enough of the product will coat the leaves. Even if youre lucky enough to get a few flakes on the leaves, its not going to be effective enough to work.The key to killing violets in the lawn is a professional-grade broadleaf liquid herbicide that will stick to the leaves and ultimately knock wild violets back. This must be coupled with a long-term strategy, including spraying multiple times a year, particularly in the fall when certain products are able to be used in cooler temperatures.
In addition to spot treating the violets repeatedly from spring through fall, youll also want to focus on a lawn care program that encourages a healthy and thick lawn. Because violets thrive in sparse lawns, the thicker your lawn is, the more likely it will choke out these pesky weeds.
Thickening your lawn can be achieved with a program that incorporates regular fertilization, looks at improving the soil with necessary pH corrections, and includes aeration and overseeding every fall.
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How To Kill Wild Violet
Find out how to banish this pesky weed from your lawn.
Wild violet is a perennial weed found in many northern regions of the U.S. It flowers in early spring and is usually found in the shady, damp areas in your yard.
Killing wild violets in your lawn can be a difficult challenge, but we can help. One thing to keep in mind: Wild violets are best controlled in the fall as they are preparing to go into winter.
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Consider Different Turfgrass Blends
Turfgrass mix is almost always blended because the diversity makes your lawn more resistant to disease, drought, and infestations. However, if your lawn is especially prone to wild violets, you may want to ask your lawn care professional about adding more fescue to the mix. Compared to other common grass blends, like Kentucky bluegrass, fescues are better at withstanding violet infestations.
How To Identify Wild Violets
Wild violets like shady spots that have fertile soil and our commonly found in irrigated lawns. Their leaves tend to look cupped toward the flower. Because the leaves are waxy and cupped the wild violet is able to withstand herbicide by letting the herbicide just roll down and drop off the leaf. Wild violets have Blue/purplish flowers which show up in May. Wild Violets are comparable to Creeping Charlie because they are both weeds that are difficult to kill, and they both have underground root systems that makes it easy for these weeds to take over a lawn.
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Factor Number One: Violets Have Two Kinds Of Flowers:
- The delicate purple ones that kids pluck and play around with, and
- The hidden unopened flower buds that reside underneath the leaves which shield from any harm.
The visible purple flowers are usually infertile, while the ones hiding under the leaves are highly fertile, and they can also self-pollinate and fertilize themselves Just imagine they dont have to flower to reproduce this is so weird! Right?
Choosing A Lawn Care Company To Win The War On Tough Weeds
While it may feel like the battles against these weeds are never-ending, when you choose to work with a lawn care company that employs a long-term strategy against tough-to-control weeds like violets and ground ivy, then youll finally start to see some light at the end of the tunnel.
With the right approach, youll see these weeds lessening each year as your thick and healthy lawn fills in. Of course, when it comes to combating aggressive weeds, you absolutely must keep up with a proactive annual program. Even taking just one year off could land you right back in a mess. But with the right care, performed regularly, you can stop feeling like progress is hopeless and start seeing the results you desire.
Are you ready to have a thicker lawn and get rid of violets and ground ivy at your Allentown, Bethlehem, or Easton, PA home? Get in touch with us to get some free expert advice and learn more about our lawn care programs which include three lawn care pricing options.
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