You might see dandelions in your yard and think they are a pretty flower, but technically, they are classified as broadleaf, perennial weeds. Your kids might love plucking the white-headed ones up out of the grass and blowing them away while making a wish, but what they’re really doing is spreading hundreds of baby seeds all over your yard. While they can actually be considered an edible, beneficial weed that provides great nutrition and can help add nutrients and nitrogen to the soil, some may consider their existence unsightly. There are several different approaches on how to get rid of dandelions. Here’s what you can do to kill and prevent them from growing in your yard:

– There are specific weed removal tools for dandelions that can be found at your local home garden center. These handy tools can be used to dig up not only the flower, but the entire tap root of the plant, preventing re-growth.

– Avoid dandelion sprouting by mowing your lawn often. By chopping off the head of the yellow dandelions before they can sprout and mature into the white-headed, seed-bearing form, you are also preventing re-germination of the plant.

– After mowing your lawn, leave the grass clippings to cover the dandelion. This helps provide a sort of “blanket” over the plant, preventing it from sunlight, which is necessary for growth.

– Go to your home garden center and purchase corn gluten meal (CGM), or another weed-killing spray herbicide and sprinkle it over the dandelion population.

– Less conventional methods include pouring boiling water over the plants, or spraying them with a vinegar-water mixture (no more than 5% or 10% concentration of vinegar). This will kill them within days.

If the dandelion problem has grown out of control and you would like some professional help, try using TalkLocal to locate a landscaper near you. TalkLocal is a free service that will connect you with top-quality, reputable companies in your neighborhood, within minutes. Simply enter in your problem, location and availability and TalkLocal will contact multiple landscaping professionals, who will then call YOU directly, ready to help.

This entry was updated on Wednesday, June 17th, 2015 at 11:55 am. This entry was originally posted on Monday, November 12th, 2012 at 6:00 pm and is filed under Landscapers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.