grassy weed

[brenda50]

I have a yard, where straw that was put down for planting fescue grass, the straw has went to seed and has grown in the yard. The customer wants to sow fescue, but what should I do with the grassy weed(straw). One lawn supplier, says only roundup will kills this is this true?

Brenda

[vegomatic40]

This is one of the reasons I am resistent when a customer requests wheat straw. No matter how "clean" they say it is, it usually contains all kinds of grassy weeds. Most of the time the weed you are seeing is actually wheat that germinated shortly after you put down the straw and they started watering. If you get a positive I.D. that it is wheat I would suggest doing nothing as the heat in early to mid-May will kill it. There are a few selective grassy weed controls out there that would control others (goosegrass, dallisgrass, orchardgrass etc.) but, they tend to "hang around" and can interfere with germination. Glyphosate on the other hand is basically inert when it hits the soil and breaks down rapidly allowing you to seed almost immediately afterwards. If the area isn't large I would simply spot-spray with Glyphosate.