GrassRoots Turf
Types of Weeds
A Glossary of Broadleaf and Grassy Weeds
Broadleaf Weeds
- Alligatorweed: Invasive aquatic perennial with hollow stems and white clover-like flowers.
- Alsike Clover: Short-lived perennial clover with pink-to-white heads and trifoliate leaves.
- Annual Sowthistle: Prickly annual with milky sap and dandelion-like yellow blooms.
- Asiatic Hawksbeard: Cool-season annual; lobed rosette leaves and small yellow flower heads.
- Birdsfoot Trefoil: Low perennial legume; yellow flowers and bird’s-foot-shaped seedpods.
- Black Medic: Mat-forming annual legume with trifoliate leaves and tiny yellow clusters.
- Bracted Plantain: Narrow-leaf plantain with long, bracted seed spikes on wiry stalks.
- Bristly Mallow: Creeping perennial with round leaves and small orange-red flowers.
- Broadleaf Plantain: Flat rosette of oval leaves with parallel veins and tall spikes.
- Buckhorn Plantain: Narrow lance-shaped leaves and compact, cone-like flowering heads.
- Bulbous Buttercup: Glossy yellow flowers; bulb-like stem base; prefers cool, moist soils.
- Bull Thistle: Biennial with spiny leaves and large purple, bristly flower heads.
- Bushy Buttonweed: Prostrate summer annual with rough stems and small white tubular flowers.
- Canada Thistle: Aggressive rhizomatous perennial thistle with spiny leaves and purple heads.
- Carolina False Dandelion: Dandelion look-alike with branched stems and yellow flower heads.
- Carolina Geranium: Deeply lobed leaves, pinkish flowers, and beaked seed capsules.
- Carpetweed: Radiating mats with whorled leaves and tiny white star-shaped flowers.
- Catchweed Bedstraw: Sticky, clinging annual with hooked hairs and whorled narrow leaves.
- Centella: Creeping mat-former with rounded, scalloped leaves; favors damp sites.
- Chamberbitter: Mimosa-like leaflets; beadlike seed capsules on undersides of branches.
- Chicory: Tough taproot; sky-blue ray flowers on branching, leafless stems.
- Cinquefoil: Low plant with five leaflets and small yellow buttercup-like flowers.
- Coat Buttons: Prostrate, hairy stems with daisy-like flowers and persistent burrlike heads.
- Common Chickweed: Cool-season mat with tiny white starry flowers and delicate stems.
- Common Mallow: Round, crinkled leaves; “cheese-wheel” seedpods on sprawling stems.
- Common Ragweed: Erect, highly allergenic annual with finely dissected leaves.
- Creeping Indigo: Prostrate legume with pink spikes; toxic to grazing animals.
- Creeping Oxalis: Low, reddish-stemmed oxalis with yellow flowers and trifoliate leaves.
- Cupid’s Shaving Brush: Slender stems bearing small pink-purple thistle-like flower heads.
- Curly Dock: Wavy-margined leaves; tall stems with dense reddish seed clusters.
- Cutleaf Evening Primrose: Deeply divided leaves; yellow flowers that open toward evening.
- Dandelion: Perennial rosette with toothed leaves, bright yellow heads, windborne seed.
- Dayflower: Fleshy leaves; blue, three-petaled flowers enclosed by a green spathe.
- Dog Fennel: Tall, aromatic stems with threadlike foliage and fluffy seedheads.
- False Dandelion (Cat’s Ear): Hairy leaves; branched stalks bearing several dandelion-like blooms.
- Florida Betony: Mint with square stems and white “rattlesnake” segmented tubers.
- Florida Pellitory: Sticky, green herb with inconspicuous flowers along the stems.
- Garden Spurge: Prostrate spurge with hairy stems, spotted leaves, and milky sap.
- Ground Ivy: Creeping mint with scalloped leaves and purple tubular flowers.
- Groundsel: Small annual with yellow, rayless daisy heads and downy seed.
- Hairy Beggarticks: Yellow daisies; barbed seeds readily cling to clothing and fur.
- Heal All: Low mint with square stems and purple, stacked flower spikes.
- Horseweed: Tall, single-stemmed fleabane; hairy leaves; often herbicide-resistant.
- Knawel: Dense, low mats of needlelike leaves and tiny green flowers.
- Largeflower Pusley: Prostrate plant with rough leaves and showy white star-shaped flowers.
- Lawn Burweed: Low winter annual with spiny, painful seed burs in spring.
- Lespedeza (Common): Wiry summer annual; trifoliate leaves with parallel veins.
- Marsh Parsley: Fine, threadlike foliage; small umbrella-like clusters of flowers.
- Matchweed (Frogfruit): Creeping mats with opposite leaves and button-like flower clusters.
- Moneywort: Trailing perennial with round leaves and bright yellow cup-shaped flowers.
- Mouse Ear Chickweed: Hairy, larger-leaved chickweed with white, notched petals.
- Mouse Ear Cress: Tiny rosette with small white flowers; quick to seed.
- Narrowleaf Cudweed: Gray-green, woolly foliage with small white, papery flower heads.
- Orange Hawkweed: Hairy leaves and vivid orange dandelion-like flower clusters.
- Oxalis (Wood Sorrel): Heart-shaped trifoliate leaves; sour taste; yellow or white flowers.
- Paleseed Plantain: Hairy rosette; slender spikes with pale, conspicuous seeds.
- Parsley Piert: Miniature parsley-like leaves; tiny green flowers close to stems.
- Pigweed (Amaranthus): Coarse stems with dense green spikes; prolific seed producer.
- Pineapple Weed: Chamomile relative; pineapple-scented foliage and rayless yellow heads.
- Prickly Lettuce: Spines along leaf midrib underneath; milky sap; tall.
- Prostrate Spurge: Red, mat-forming stems; spotted leaves; irritating milky latex.
- Purple Deadnettle: Square stems; purple-tinged top leaves and spring whorls of flowers.
- Red Clover: Perennial clover with pink-red heads and white chevron leaf mark.
- Sheep Sorrel: Arrow-shaped leaves; sour taste; thrives in acidic, poor soils.
- Shepherd’s Purse: Basal rosette; distinctive heart-shaped seedpods on slender stems.
- Sprawling Horseweed: Tall, branched fleabane with narrow leaves and fluffy seed.
- Spring Beauty: Early spring ephemeral with pink-striped white flowers.
- Swinecress: Low mustard with finely divided leaves and pungent odor.
- Three Seeded Mercury: Erect annual with serrated leaves and three-seeded capsules.
- Threeflower Beggarweed: Low trifoliate legume; segmented pods stick to clothing.
- Thymeleaf Speedwell: Creeping stems with tiny blue, lined four-petaled flowers.
- Tropical Chickweed: Sprawling, tender stems; opposite leaves and small white blossoms.
- Virginia Buttonwood: Prostrate perennial with opposite leaves and small white tubular flowers.
- Virginia Dwarf Dandelion: Small rosette; slender stems bearing tiny yellow heads.
- White Clover: Low stoloniferous clover with white heads; often patches in turf.
- Whitehead Broom: Small herb with clustered white flower heads; spreads by seed.
- Wild Carrot (Queen Anne’s Lace): Ferny leaves; lacy white umbels on wiry stems.
- Wild Violet: Heart-shaped leaves; purple or white spring flowers; persistent rhizomes.
- Yarrow: Aromatic, feathery leaves; flat clusters of white to pink flowers.
- Yellow Hawkweed: Hairy leaves and yellow dandelion-like heads; spreads by stolons.
- Yellow Rocket: Spring-blooming mustard with bright yellow racemes from a rosette.
Grassy Weeds
- Annual Bluegrass: Pale green, tufted Poa with whitish seedheads in cool seasons.
- Annual Kyllinga: Low sedge with triangular stems and round, green seedballs.
- Annual Ryegrass: Shiny leaves with clasping auricles; upright seed spikes.
- Barnyardgrass: Coarse summer annual; no ligule; purplish, bristly panicles.
- Bermudagrass: Aggressive warm-season grass with stolons and rhizomes; dense mats.
- Blanket Crabgrass: Prostrate crabgrass forming broad mats with hairy nodes and sheaths.
- Blue Eyed Grass: Iris relative; grasslike leaves with small blue star flowers.
- Broadleaf Panicum: Wide-leaf summer annual grass with arching foliage and open panicles.
- Broomsedge: Wiry bunchgrass turning orange-brown in winter; thrives on poor soils.
- Bull Paspalum: Coarse paspalum forming clumps; hairy leaf margins and tall spikes.
- Carpetgrass: Coarse, stoloniferous grass favoring wet, acidic soils; flat seedheads.
- Creeping Bentgrass: Fine, stoloniferous turfgrass; forms thatch; invades cool, moist lawns.
- Cylindric Sedge: Clump-forming sedge with cylindrical seed spikes on triangular stems.
- Dallisgrass: Robust clumps with sticky, banded seedheads; often infected with ergot.
- Doveweed: Fleshy, dayflower relative; late-emerging mats with tiny bluish flowers.
- Downy Brome (Cheatgrass): Hairy leaves; drooping, nodding panicles; winter annual.
- Egyptian Crabgrass (Crowfootgrass): Fingered seedheads resembling a crow’s foot; prostrate habit.
- Green Foxtail: Bristly green bottlebrush seedheads; smooth leaf blades.
- Green Kyllinga: Spreading sedge with glossy green round heads and rhizomes.
- Hairy Crabgrass: Coarse, hairy leaves; fingered seedheads; sprawling summer annual.
- Johnsongrass: Tall, rhizomatous grass with large, open purplish panicles.
- Nimblewill: Fine, wiry stolons forming patchy tufts; thrives in shade.
- Orchardgrass: Clump-forming cool-season grass; folded leaves and early seedheads.
- Purple Nutsedge: Sedge with purple-brown seedheads and persistent nutlike tubers.
- Quackgrass: Rhizomatous cool-season grass with clasping auricles and long rhizomes.
- Redtop: Cool-season grass with airy, often reddish panicles and short rhizomes.
- Rescuegrass: Cool-season brome with flattened sheaths and nodding seedheads.
- Rough Bluegrass: Light-green, stoloniferous Poa; thrives in shade and moisture.
- Saltgrass: Rhizomatous grass tolerant of saline soils and periodic flooding.
- Sandbur: Spiny burr-covered seedheads on prostrate to ascending stems.
- Smooth Crabgrass: Finer crabgrass with fewer hairs and low, radiating growth.
- Smutgrass: Tough clumps; black smut often coats mature seedheads.
- Star Of Bethlehem: Bulbous monocot with grasslike leaves and white star flowers.
- Stinkgrass: Open panicles; crushed foliage emits a distinct, unpleasant odor.
- Surinam Sedge: Tufted sedge with umbrella-like seedheads and triangular stems.
- Texas Sedge: Small native sedge forming delicate clumps in shady sites.
- Timothy: Cool-season hay grass with dense cylindrical “cattail-like” seedheads.
- Torpedograss: Aggressive rhizomes with sharp tips; invades shores and wet turf.
- Tropical Crabgrass: Robust crabgrass with hairy sheaths and multiple fingered seedheads.
- Velvetgrass: Soft, velvety leaves and sheaths; silvery, fluffy panicles.
- Wild Barley: Bristly, awned seedheads that can irritate pets’ mouths.
- Wild Garlic: Hollow, round leaves; onion odor; produces aerial bulbils.
- Witchgrass: Hairy seedlings; airy, tumbleweed-like panicles on mature plants.
- Yellow Foxtail: Bottlebrush seedhead with yellowish cast; hairs at leaf base.
- Yellow Nutsedge: Sedge with yellow-brown seedheads and underground edible-like tubers.
