Getting rid of clover in a lawn

[riptides]

No one mentions the good luck charms one can get from the clover patches?

One of my girls has that special gift of finding four leaf clovers in an instant, while her old man cannot find one to save his life. Even if she points out the smaller area where they reside, I still cannot find them without much stress.

Truely amazing.

 

[marimus]

If your soil is healthy, then the grass will out-compete the clover everytime. This is because grass is a more efficient photosynthesizer (it uses the C4 photosynthetic pathway - you can google it if your interested).

Long story short, the clover is "winning" because their is something wrong with your soil. The good news is that if you let the clover take over, next year the grass will be "winning" in the improved soil the clover gives you.

Another good method that doesn't involve any herbicides, is to fertilize the lawn with Ammonium Sulphate. This will give the grass a terrific boost and kill the clover - but you will probably also need some lime depending on your current pH.

 

[WarrenF]

In thirty years of using 2-4-D, I have NEVER seen it kill clover. It will make it sick. It will perhaps impede its growth....but I have NEVER seen it kill clover. I also have NEVER seen clover being choked out by grass.

There are some herbicides out now, that are selective for a particular plant. I would check with a supplier of golf course chemicals. Since those folks fight all sorts of intrusive plants, like crab grass and broadleaf plants, they are quite knowledgeable. In our area one business is Rogers....check around.

 

[marimus]

In thirty years of using 2-4-D, I have NEVER seen it kill clover. It will make it sick. It will perhaps impede its growth....but I have NEVER seen it kill clover. I also have NEVER seen clover being choked out by grass.

Here is one example I have some photos of. Photos are taken 12 months appart, if you have a keen eye you can see a little clover in the second photo still - but its 99% gone using no chemicals or fertilizers at all.


(Click for bigger versions)

As the clover improves the fertility of the soil, the grass chokes it out.

I'll have a dig around my photos because I have another set that shows the deep lush green grass growing in the same pattern as the clover was growing the year before.

 

[pintodeluxe]

Weedmaster is an exceptional postemergent broadleaf herbicide. Available in liquid concentrate. It works much better that weed-n-feed granules because it coats the clover leaf. Weedmaster also eliminates dandelions, chickweed, plantain, and creeping charlie.

 

[charlz]

Someone on this board had previously recommended Green Light "Wipe Out". It actually thinned the white clover out for me with one treatment. As already mentioned this is where 2,4,d alone* would only slow it down for a few days. 2,4,d will kill alfalfa and most red clover but it doesn't do much to white clover that I have seen.

* IIRC Wipe Out has 2,4,d as well as some of the other broadleaf killers... its a cocktail of sorts.

 

[Chad2660]

I just purchased a 25 gallon sprayer to spray 2,4-D around about 3 acres of my property. The problem I have is that I read through the 2,4-D booklet several times and I can't find how much I should use per gallon of water. I'm not using it to spray fields/crops, I just want to kill some of the weeds in my yard.

Any advise will be greatly appreciated.

 

[MikeRoger]

I use Speedzone herbicide which costs $84.00 a gallon and a gallon will take care of 2 acres. You can see the clover start to curl the next morning and in 7 days it will be dead completely.

 

[zmjc]

Funny... I go to the local feed & seed to buy dutch white clover for the lawn...

 

[ray66v]

2-4-D is not an efficient way to go after clover. Trimec is much more effective, and a better all around weed killer.

Do not apply either in hot weather.

With a serious infestation, it will likely take 2-3 applications of Trimec before you get every bit of it out. But, the last 2 applications, (about 10-14 days apart), can be spot applications where needed.

It's about $30/gal at TSC.

I put 1oz in a gallon of water for clover.