On Nov 30, 6:27*pm, Gordon wrote:
Some background:
So I bought this house two summers ago. When I moved in it
had been empty for over 6 months. *The lawn was a mess.
There were weeds growing that were taller than my 7 year
old son. My wife and I spent the better part of 3 days
just pulling weeds. *When the lawn came into it's own,
there was a lot of dirt. The back part of the lawn behind
the house was used as a dog run and was covered with wood
chips and pine needles. *A huge (and ongoing) effort is
going into raking and disposing of pine needles and wood
chips. I've managed to regain about 2/3rds of my back yard.

I have been trying to encourage the lawn to establish and
spread naturally. I don't want to tear it up and re-sod.
So I have been happy to see any grass growing. *But now I
see that I have crab grass in my developing lawn. ARrrggg!
A bunch of it was next to a part that I had re-seeded
this summer and the crab grass was invading the new grass.
So I spant an hour yesterday with a cultivator hoe digging
into the crab grass patch and pulling it up along with
it's long stringy roots. Several of those roots ran into
the patch of new grass and came up with sveral tufts of
crab grass attached. I don't mind tearing up this patch
of crab grass since there appears to be no good grass in
here. *But I also see that there are patches of mixed
good/crab grass around the lawn.

What I wonder is: Should I try to uproot the crab grass
in these mixed patches? Or would it be better to just
sprey it down with crab crass killer?

Also; It is probably too late in the season to think about
reseeding the bare patch where I uprooted the crab grass.
Would it be a good idea to mulch the patch with leaves for
the winter to keep the weeds out?

Locational info: I live in Portland, OR and we are going into
a dry cool spell. *Looks like no rain in the forecast for
the next few days.

You need to apply a pre-emergent in the spring. Don't know about your
area but rule of thumb here is just before forsythias bloom.
Crabgrass dies in the winter but next years crop of seeds are already
in your lawn.