How to Identify Henbit Lawn Weed

If small purple flowers appear in your turfgrass in early spring, its time to take some defensive measures. There is a good chance that what you are seeing is henbit (Lamium amplexicaule), a broadleaf annual weed that is common throughout the United States.

Instructions

1. Determine that the plant is a weed. Any plant growing in an undesired location is a weed. A beautiful daylily growing in your turfgrass would be considered a weed. Henbit frequently appears in flower and vegetable gardens and lawns and inhibits the growth of other plants. Henbit is a weed.

2. Study the weed's general form. Henbit is a spreading weed that forms mounds and can grow to a height of 10 to 12 inches. Henbit, or common dead nettle as it is sometimes called, belongs to the mint family. A characteristic of the family is that they have square stems.

3. Observe the weed's growing location. Henbit prefers soil that is moist and fertile. The weed can quickly take hold in thin or bare spots in a lawn. Newly seeded lawns are particularly susceptible to infestation by henbit.

4. Examine the leaves. Amplexicaul is a botanical term that means "to clasp the stem." Henbit's dark green foliage clasps the stem. Leaves are normally 1/2 to 1-inch long, have rounded teeth and appear crinkled at the edges.

5. Evaluate the flowers. The flowers of the henbit weed are pinkish or pinkish-purple, tubular in shape and sit on top of the whorls of the top leaves. The flowers are approximately 3/4 of an inch long. They appear from March through June and again in September.

Tips & Warnings

• Henbit spreads only by seed and is generally not a problem in dense, vigorous turf grass areas.