Best way to remove clover from kikuyu and mixed lawn?
Hi team – I am a complete newbie trying to establish a new lawn – we are north of Auckland near Warkworth in costal spot that is hot & windy.
In September last year, after laying 150-200mm of topsoil, the lawn was hydroseeded. I understand a combination of perennial ryegrass, creeping red fescue, browntop, and tall fescue seeds (I can’t tell one from the other). Started out well but with only occasional watering the lawn dried out a few times over summer.
So now the lawn is now quite patchy, with lots of clover intrusion – a bit of a mess really. There is some kikuyu intruding also – but I am OK with this as it is probably the most reliable lawn for our location in the long term – probably should have sown it to start with.
So the plan is to instal a proper automatic irrigation system ASAP, and work hard on the lawn over the next few months and see if I can get an improvement next summer.
So advice please – i plan to start with getting rid of the clover first, and then move on to topdressing.
My first question is – what is the best product to use for killing off the clover – noting that i want to keep the Kikuyu. And should I fertilise now?
Thanks in advance!
Apply a fertilizer like all seasons, clover is a sign of low nitrogen levels in a readily available form for grass .
Bwc herbicide safe on warm and cool seasons grasses. Kikuyu is a warm seasons, nz's brown top, rye , fine fescue blend is cool seasons grasses.
Once kikuyu establishes , herbicide like msf600 will take out rye and a lot of other grasses but not fine fescue or kikuyu.
Bwc no composting, it's a small quantity of bow and arrow herbicide.
Rye might of died off. I'd be curious of the grass growing well beside the clover as it's a nitrogen fixer but clover doesn't share the nitrogen.
Going off those photos, I’d be inclined to kill the lot off in spring and start again with a single cultivar. Something like NZLA ETF would suit your location perfectly. Have a read through the Lawn 101 guide on the NZLA website under the Lawn Tips section, that’ll give you a good grounding in the basics around fertiliser, irrigation and general care. At the moment it’s a bit of a dog’s dinner and, in my opinion, it’ll be more work trying to fix it than starting fresh. Before doing anything, spend a bit of time learning the basics first. If you set on the kikuyu being the end grass then it’s a summer job since that’s a warm-season species and will respond best then. BWC herbicide is safe on all the grasses you mentioned for broadleaf herbicide. MSF600 will take out grasses and leave the kikuyu/FF.
Have you done anything with it since September? It looks severely underfed, which is why the clover is thriving. That’s not a good place to be heading into winter. You need to get some All Seasons down ASAP to help feed the turf through winter, otherwise it’s not going to be in a good place in a few months.
I would personally forget the kikuyu idea for now since it’s completely the wrong time of year. Give it a feed with the mentioned fertiliser and hit it with NZLA Gold. That will knock/kill the kikuyu but leave the other grasses, it’ll also clear out a lot of the crap and leave you with a decent-looking lawn until it’s the correct time to do a proper renovation.
Alternatively, BWC is safe on all the mentioned grasses and can be used alongside the All Seasons 👍
It would be worth having a look at a couple guides I wrote last year:
1. https://www.newzealandlawnaddicts.com/lawn-tips/how-to-water-your-lawn/
2. https://www.newzealandlawnaddicts.com/lawn-tips/lawn-care-101-getting-the-basics-right/
There’s also some more here: https://www.newzealandlawnaddicts.com/lawn-tips/