Shucks, who needs to go to a warm south Florida beach for a winter break?
So far this winter, the pond bank at Bovina is comfort enough for me.
I’ve even seen a scattering of little purple blooms in the yard that are not due yet.
That’s henbit weed blooming early because of the weather.
If anybody cares, you could look closely and find a proliferation of annual bluegrass, clover, chickweed and Carolina geranium all ahead of schedule.
But I doubt anybody much cares about these winter weeds right now. We’re used to dealing with those later on and it’s not later on yet.
The cool weather weeds we don’t want grow a whole lot like the cool weather plants farmers plant and grow on purpose.
In our area, winter farm crops are wheat for grain and ryegrass and clover for cattle grazing. In other areas, winter time farming includes those plus oats, barley and rapeseed. And somebody somewhere in Mississippi plants all of them as food plots at the deer camp.
Most cool weather plants, including the weeds in our lawns, “do their thing” at temperatures approximately between 50 and 80 degrees.
We call them winter weeds or winter crops, but they don’t make growth or reproductive progress at really cold temperatures. They do tolerate and survive the cold and take off when it warms up to their liking.
And of course changes in day length joins temperature effecting the status of plants, some more so than others.
A farm example of cool weather plant growth; Mississippi farmers could plant wheat in September and expect quick germination and growth if soil moisture were adequate. But even if a field is cleared from August harvested corn or soybeans, farmers won’t plant wheat hereabouts until November for two reasons.
First, fall lush wheat growth is just begging for an infestation of aphids. Wait until November to plant and by the time the wheat gets any size, it is too cold for aphids.
The second reason is even more economically sound than avoiding aphid control.
With September and October growth, it would be possible for each wheat plant’s one and only seed head, i.e. grain, to develop and move up into the stalk ahead of time.
Then a severe freeze in January or February could kill the immature grain within the plant, leaving nothing to emerge later on for harvest.
Back to the lawn weeds; although most of us really don’t care about some early green in the dull winter yard, I can come up with one possible advantage.
The post emergence herbicides some homeowners typically spray too late in spring can be used during unseasonably warm spells in winter.
A bonus is the hormone-type herbicides with 2,4-D as an ingredient are much less risky to St. Augustine and centipede with temperatures below 75 degrees.
So weather like we currently have makes for growthy “killable” weeds and a good measure of safety for the lawn if 2,4-D et al is applied at the proper correct rate.
Terry Rector is a spokesman for the Warren County Soil and Water Conservation District.