A nice lawn adds curb appeal to your home and can even help raise your home's value, but many different types of weeds can take up residence amongst your grass. Crabgrass is a troublesome weed that can take over your lawn. Here are three things you need to know about crabgrass. 

What does crabgrass look like?

Crabgrass is a large, green weed with very hairy leaves and stems. The weed can be as large as three feet long, and it tends to sprawl across the ground rather than growing upwards. Each stem develops two to 10 racemes—flower stalks—which can be up to eight inches long. These racemes are light green, flat and narrow.  

Crabgrass often grows in colonies, so you may notice many of these plants clustered in one area of your lawn. 

How does crabgrass spread?

Crabgrass is a summer annual, so it needs to produce seeds to ensure that new plants can grow the following year. A single crabgrass plant can produce a whopping 150,000 seeds, and these seeds lie dormant throughout the winter, and then they germinate in the late spring or early summer. These new crabgrass plants will then produce their own seeds, and the cycle continues.

While many other types of weeds only use seeds to reproduce, crabgrass also uses its own stems. When the nodes of these stems come into contact with the soil, they can form a new root system. A new crabgrass plant will then grow from this new root system.

How can you control crabgrass?

To control crabgrass, you'll need to target both of its reproduction methods. To prevent the weeds from spreading with their stems, hand-pull them as soon as you notice them. When the weeds are still young, their root systems are immature and easier to dislodge from the soil.

Once the crabgrass becomes established, hand-pulling may be difficult, and using a hoe can leave unsightly holes in your lawn. Instead, established crabgrass should be destroyed with appropriate post-emergent herbicides.

You can target seeds with pre-emergent herbicides. Spray these herbicides in the early spring, before the seeds have had the opportunity to germinate. These herbicides will stop the crabgrass seeds from germinating, but since they don't affect any established plants, they won't hurt your lawn.

If you're having trouble controlling crabgrass in your yard, hire a landscaping service (such as Campbell's Nurseries & Garden Centers Inc to help you take back control of your lawn.