Spraying Thistles with 2-4 D

[dt34715]

I think I read on another post that weeds sprayed with 2-4 D will come back the next year. Is this correct?

 

[M5farm]

If you kill the plant it won't come back. The seed it distributed will make a new plant

 

[dun]

Thistles are a 2 year plant. The first year there is just the rosette flat on the ground. Kill that and you won;t get that plant to go to flower/seed the next year. If you kill it when it is in the flower/seed stage that plant won;t come back. In either case, the hundreds of seeds that the plant came from will sprout the next year.

 

[ga.prime]

If you get sufficient coverage on a thistle with 2-4D it's not coming back. If the thistles have already bloomed they're going to die and not come back whether you spray them or not. However, if you look closely you will often find thistles in the rosette stage growing in close proximity to thistles that have gone into the flower stalk phase. They'll come back the next year unless they are sprayed because like dun said, they're a two year or perennial plant and the rosette stage is the first year.

 

[ga.prime]

I should have said biennial instead of perennial in the previous post. Perennials live multiple years and biennials have a two year life cycle.

 

[ibetyamissedme]

Basagran kills Canadian thistles.

 

[Black and Good]

I've been using Milestone this year it works well. That's what the extension office is recommending here. B&G

 

[Chappydog]

We use Grazon NXT down here and it kills em just fine.

 

[regolith]

If you kill the plant it won't come back. The seed it distributed will make a new plant

Canadian (creeping) thistles are the exception because the chemical never seems to get to every bit of the root. Perseverance will get those. Every spray gets a big proportion of the plant so three or four sprays should pretty much eliminate the patch.
You can't beat the neighbour's thistle seeds... ever. You can spray the stuff right off your own patch and his seeds will just keep on blowing in.

 

[SPH]

2-4 D is great stuff, kills everything but grass and I'll use it on my lawn because the cheap stuff like Ortho and Bayer weed killers just don't do as good of a job . The earlier you can spray the better, just make sure you spray before they form a bloom else it will go to seed and you'll have new thistles show up next year.