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Index : Plant Care
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- 5. Caution When Selecting - Using Weed Killers - Top
- Just look at the shelves in garden departments and you’ll find them stock to overflowing with weed killers. But some of those products can be very dangerous for home gardeners to use. Not in terms of harm to people, pets or wildlife, but some of these products can be very harmful to valuable landscape plants. Chief among them are products containing a weed killer called Triox.
Triox is a total vegetation killer! It’s advertised for use on walks, driveways, along fences and other spots where no growth is desired. But read the label information and what you’ll find is that Triox will damage or kill any desirable plant who’s roots it comes in contact with! So applying Triox to a fence line, driveway, walk, or patio will surely allow this vegetation killer to move down into the soil where it is likely to contact underlying roots of surrounding desirable trees and shrubs. In addition, a heavy rain can wash the Triox from the area of application to surrounding areas causing additional damage. The bottom line for home gardeners - don’t use products containing Triox! Be very cautious using any product labeled, vegetation or brush killer. They’re likely to have similar harmful effects.
Another herbicide product that can damage trees and shrubs is the lawn weed killer - Dicamba. If tree or shrub roots are growing in your lawn area, and you apply Dicamba it too can be absorbed by tree and shrub roots, damaging these desirable plants. It’s common for mature trees to have roots that extend out as much as 4 times farther than the spread of the branches. Shrubs also have roots extending out well beyond the ends of their branches.
Fortunately, one of the most popular weed killers for home gardeners - Roundup - is relatively safe to use. It is not absorbed by plant roots and has no harmful effects in the soil, unlike Triox. It kills weeds by being sprayed on, and absorbed by, their leaves and other green tissue such as green stems. It moves from the leaves to the roots via the plants internal cambium tissue. Once it reaches the roots, it kills the entire plant.
Roundup is actually the well-known brand name for the chemical ‘Glyphosate’. It is available as the active ingredient in a number of herbicide products such for the control of perennial broadleaf and grassy weeds. It’s one of the most effective products for the control of certain hard-to-control woody-stemmed weeds such as our notorious Desert Broom.
The best way kill Desert Broom and other woody brush is by applying undiluted Roundup concentrate directly to cut stems at the base of the plant. This application should be made while the plant is actively growing. So, it’s best to hold off treatment until late March or early April. At that time, cut the stems of Desert Broom off close to the ground and immediately paint them with concentrated Roundup. The material will be absorbed through the cuts and transfer directly to the roots.
The product you select should have a concentration of at least 18% Glyphosate. The simplest way to apply the weed killer is to pour a small amount in a styrofoam cup and use a small paint brush to dip and paint the weed killer on to the cut stems. “Because of the potential for contamination, do not pour any left over Glyphosate back into the original container. Just use it up by applying it to the cut stems.
Written by John Begeman, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the University of Arizona,
520-626-5161.
- Updated: August 24, 2006
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