Kikuyu In Buffalo Grass

Common Kikuyu invading Buffalo

Is Your Buffalo Really A Buffalo Anymore?

If your Buffalo lawn isn't looking quite as it should, and you're noticing that some parts of the lawn are outgrowing other areas, then it may be time to take a closer look into your lawn to discover exactly what is happening.

Because your beautiful Buffalo lawn may actually now be mainly Kikuyu!!!

How Kikuyu Invades Buffalo

Most Kikuyu invasions into other lawns and into the open environment is due to the very fine grass seed that Kikuyu produces. This seed easily blows around in the wind across roads, and is spread by pets in their fur, by water and rains, and by birds that eat and then spread the seed, and easily takes a foothold in many other surrounding areas, including home lawns and the natural environment.

The highly aggressive nature, and very fast growing speed of Kikuyu also allows this grass to establish extremely quickly once it does take hold into surrounding areas.

The Source of Most Kikuyu Invasions

The most usual source of these Kikuyu invasions are from Council lands such as parks and ovals where many councils are still using, or still maintain the old style Kikuyu grasses. And it's from these large tracts of open land which are growing old Kikuyu which then send out seeds into surrounding lawns.

And this is just one small reason why no councils should continue to maintain old style Kikuyu any more, it's just far too damaging in too many ways. Councils really do need to break out of habits from days of old and begin switching all their grasses to Zoysia, Couch or Male Sterile Kikuyu in the cases where a Kikuyu is still required.

Male Sterile Kikuyu most often produces no viable seed whatsoever, so therefore even when the grass does produce seed, and even when it does spread - it cannot establish either in surrounding lawns or within the open environment.

Why Kikuyu Is So Good At Hiding In Buffalo

For most people, we simply do not monitor our lawns so closely that we ever begin noticing every little detail which is happening within our lawns, and this is true when another grass begins invading our home lawn.

For Kikuyu in Buffalo, the problem becomes even less noticeable in the earliest stages of an invading grass because a Kikuyu leaf is often the same general width and colour of the Buffalo grass, and when we aren't specifically looking for Kikuyu, most people simply do not notice these earliest stages.

So the Kikuyu takes a foothold in the Buffalo lawn without opposition.

By the time we finally do notice that something odd is going on in our Buffalo lawn, the Kikuyu is often very strong, well established with deep roots, and has taken over large parts of the Buffalo lawn. Once a Kikuyu invasion gets to this stage, it often becomes a major problem to solve as there are no real options for homeowners to simply spray the Kikuyu out of the Buffalo.

Killing Kikuyu In Buffalo

Killing Kikuyu out of Buffalo can be very difficult as their are no weed sprays for this purpose. However if Kikuyu invades other grasses like Couch - then killing the Kikuyu is often much easier because some weed sprays which kill Kikuyu, are safe for use on Couch, so a simple weed treatment can often solve the problem.

Find out how to kill Kikuyu from Buffalo here:

Australia's Lawn Expert: How to kill Kikuyu from your lawn (very good post with pictures)

The Lawn Guide - how to kill an invading grass type

Photo credit:
Thanks to Palmetto Buffalo for supplying this article picture.
Palmetto is the world's favourite premium soft leaf Buffalo variety.