Can Lime on Your Lawn Get Rid of Weeds?

Lime performs several functions for homeowners, including: correcting soil acidity, furnishing plant nutrients, and reducing the toxicity of certain soil elements. In addition, lime can affect the spread of weeds.

Weeds

A weed is simply any plant that is unwanted and steals nutrients, water, and sunlight from desirable plants and grasses. This is a problem for homeowners attempting to grow healthy grass and farmers attempting to grow crops.

Lime and Weeds

Some people believe that lime can be used to kill weeds, particularly moss. However, according to Washington State University, lime applications do not kill weeds. What lime can do is help grasses grow better which in turn helps to prevent weed infestations. Generally, lime should be applied to established lawns at the ratio of 35 pounds of lime per 1,000 square feet.

Other Solutions

Weed management includes two basic approaches: chemical and non-chemical. Chemical approaches involve applying selective herbicides (designed to target a specific weed) or non-selective herbicides (designed to kill everything they touch). Non-chemical approaches depend on the extent of the weed infestation, but include everything from hand-pulling to complete soil solarization.

Lime On Your Lawn Get Rid Of Weeds?

When applied to soil, lime can even out the soil’s pH, which is a measure of how acidic or alkaline it is. The pH scale ranges from 0.0 to 14.0, with numbers below 7.0 being acidic and numbers above alkaline, or basic. Because weeds are opportunists, they look for any sign of weakness in turfgrass. There are, however, some hard and fast rules. Ideally, you should apply it when preparing soil for planting, but you can apply whenever lime is needed.