Selective Herbicide

Non-selective Herbicide

This is really good question and can mean the difference in a weed free lawn and a grass free lawn.  Many people, including one of my employees, do not know the different between Round-up, and Weed-B-Gon.  To start off, Round-up is made exclusively by Monsanto, Inc.  They are a rather large company out west, that specialize in this product.  They are developing certain crops that are round-up resistant to help farmers save time and money growing crops.  I think it is pretty cool.  I have heard many of you think this company is the devil.  Weed-b-gon is product made by Ortho.  I have never been to Ortho like I have Monsanto, so I don’t know much about the company, except for the product.  Ortho makes a tremendous amount of different products for the home and garden.

Let’s start with Round-up.  Round-up is made of glysophate as its primary ingredient.  Long story short, it is a high powered salt water.  It works really well.  Round-up is called a non-selective herbicide.  Ever heard that term before?  Non-selective means that it does not care what it is, it will try and kill it.  Herbicide is the medical term for weed killer.  Just like fungicide, miticide, insecticide, etc.  Now, something that people are mistaken of is Round-up does not do anything to the soil.  You can soak the dirt and as soon as it dries you can plant flowers in that same spot.  Also, Round-up does not prevent seeds from emerging.  Round-up is a foliage killer, meaning that the chemical has to touch foliage in order to kill that plant.  Plants take in their nutrients and such through their ‘skin’, so that is where the round up needs to touch them.  Round-up will kill just about everything it touches, so do not spray anything that you want alive.  (In my opinion, usually a little overspray on a shrub will do nothing to damage the shrub!).

Now for Weed-B-Gon (wbg).  Wbg is made of the active ingredients Triclophy and Dicamba.  That means nothing to even me, except that it is different than Round-up.  We call Wbg a selective Herbicide.  Selective means that this product will target certain types of weeds and leave other plants alone.  This product is designed for you to spray all over your lawn, it will target the broadleaf weeds, such as dandelions and clover, and leave the good grass alone.  It can damage flowers in the flower bed if you get too much on them, and can burn the grass if you over concentrate an area.  This product is not designed to use on driveways, or anywhere that you are wanting complete kill of everything.  That is Round-ups job.

So now you know the difference between and selective and non-selective herbicide.  Don’t be scared of these products, they do not harm the environment if used properly, and are virtually harmless to animals once they are dry.

Happy Spraying