- Author: Anne E Schellman
Recently, someone called our office needing help identifying a plant he said was taking over his landscape and crowding out his other plants. The caller noted that the original patch of this plant had doubled in size since last year. He described it as having clover-like leaves and yellow flowers. This fits the description of several weeds, including:
- Bermuda buttercup (also called buttercup oxalis)
- California burclover
- Creeping woodsorrel
This time of year, Bermuda buttercup is prominently seen in the landscape, especially in shady areas. I suspected he might be describing this weed, so I asked if he was willing to dig up a plant and look for bulbs. After a moment of digging, he said, “Yes! I've found some small brown bulbs!” This confirmed the weed was indeed Bermuda buttercup.
In his landscape, Bermuda buttercup had taken over a 50 square-foot area and was growing in and around other ornamental landscape plants. I used the online IPM Pest Notes: Creeping Woodsorrel and Bermuda Buttercup to tell him more about this weed.
The publication recommends manual removal of the whole plant, including the bulbs. However, you can hand pull or mow the top to deplete the bulb reserves but killing the plant this way could take years.
The caller had trouble bending over and digging and hoped he could use an herbicide to kill the weeds. Unfortunately, herbicides will only kill the top portion of the plant, which will regrow. Also, if they drift to garden plants, the herbicides listed in the publication can kill them.
I recommended he call a local nursery or garden center and ask for the contact information of a professional landscaper or gardener for help digging out the weedy bulbs.
If you have one of the other two weeds mentioned in the above list, visit the Clovers Pest Notes for more information.
For identification and management help with weeds in your garden or landscape, bring in a sample to the UCCE Master Gardeners at 3800 Cornucopia Way Ste A, Modesto, CA 95358 or call (209) 525-6800.
- Author: Anne E Schellman
Just like humans, pests need food, water, and shelter to live. Unfortunately, we may unknowingly attract and even invite them to live in and around our homes!
Pest Attractors and Supporters
Some pests prefer to live outdoors, while others like the ambiance inside your garage or home. Here are some ways you may be providing pests with food, water, and shelter:
- Pet food and water bowls (indoors and outside)
- Bird feeders
- Leaking water spigots
- Open food packages in your kitchen
- Hedges and shrubs near doors or windows
Entry Points
Insect and animal pests can pass through small spaces. For example, mice can get through a hole the width of a pencil, and cockroaches can flatten themselves and squeeze through cracks. Here are some ways pests might be entering your home:
- Holes in windows and screen doors
- Cracks in the foundation of your house
- Holes in the roof or attic
- Crevices around pipes indoors (bathrooms, laundry area, kitchens) and outside
Use IPM to Manage Pests
Use integrated pest management or IPM to help you pest proof your home. First, walk in and around your home to inspect for the above pest attractors, and entry points. If you can't personally inspect your home or don't have time, you can call a pest control company and ask them to do it for you. This is helpful for hard to access places like basements and attics.
Follow directions on the Quick Tips cards below for common pests. If your pest isn't listed, check the UC IPM Website. If you find a pest you can't identify, contact the UCCE Master Gardeners of Stanislaus County at (209) 525-6800 or send an email to ucmgstanislaus@ucanr.edu.
Pantry Pests (pests found in the kitchen)
- Author: Ed Perry
Many gardeners are interested in knowing how winter temperatures affect garden pests. The hope is that following a cold winter–such as this year–fewer pests will survive to plague the garden. Unfortunately, both insect pests and plant diseases have ways of surviving our harshest winters. However, there are some things that you can do to lessen potential pest problems, mostly by eliminating the places where pests and disease may overwinter.
Although a few pests can migrate great distances, many come from sources within your garden or nearby areas, surviving on weeds, in crop debris, as pupae in soil, or as seeds, spores or eggs. You can also unknowingly bring some pests into your garden on infested transplants or contaminated soil or equipment.
![Codling moth larvae inside a fruit. [Credit: Jack Kelly Clark, UC IPM]](http://ucanr.edu/blogs/StanislausSprout//blogfiles/57017_original.jpg "Codling moth larvae inside a fruit. [Credit: Jack Kelly Clark, UC IPM]")
Good common-sense sanitation practices will help to eliminate overwintering garden pests. In your fruit trees, be sure to remove and destroy old fruit “mummies” hanging in trees and pick up and destroy any fallen nuts. Old fruits and nuts often contain pests such as codling moths. It's also very important to get rid of pruned branches, especially those from your fruit trees, that might be infested with disease or borers. Bark beetles may emerge from infested branches in late winter or early spring, so be sure to dispose of prunings as soon as possible. Don't forget to treat your fruit trees, especially peach and nectarine trees, with fungicide sprays to prevent spring diseases such as peach leaf curl; oil sprays applied now will also help to control overwintering insect and mite pests on deciduous trees.
Also, remove any weeds around your garden well before planting any new crops. Not only do weeds produce seeds that may find their way into your garden, but they are also likely to harbor numerous migrating pests. For instance, cutworms, earwigs, stink bugs, thrips and certain viruses carried by aphids and leafhoppers are all pests associated with weedy areas. If you wait until your garden is planted before destroying these weeds, the pests will move into your crops. Waiting for the weeds to dry out naturally will also encourage pest migrations. Besides, it's easier to control weeds when they're seedlings, rather than waiting until they've matured and set seeds.
Good sanitation also means making sure the planting stock you're using is free of pests. Check transplants or other greenhouse stock for aphids, diseases, nematodes and other pests. Use certified seed or stock if available. Make sure any organic soil amendments you use are free of weed seeds and pathogens, and don't move soil infested with nematodes, Bermudagrass stems, or nutsedge tubers to other parts of your garden. If you're not sure whether the soil is infested with pests, it's best to not take the chance. Also, clean equipment before moving it from infested areas.
Always be sure plant debris, particularly residue from previous vegetable crops, is completely decayed or removed before planting a new crop. A good way to destroy most crop and weed residues around your garden is by composting. Composting destroys most of the pests that may be harbored in the residues.
You can download a free copy of Composting is Good for Your Garden and the Environment to learn more.
Ed Perry is the emeritus Environmental Horticultural Advisor for University of California Cooperative Extension (UCCE) in Stanislaus County.
