Golf courses in California now have a new weapon against weeds due to the registration of a previously unavailable herbicide, which is also approved for spot treatment on residential lawns and professionally managed sports turf.

An herbicide already available in most southern and transition zone states recently received registration with the State of California Department of Pesticide Regulation for use as a spot treatment on residential lawns and professionally managed sports turf.

The herbicide, Katana®, from PBI-Gordon Corporation, is labeled for control of 58 weeds including sedges, grasses and broadleaf weeds with post-emergence and some pre-emergence activity.

The company claims that it is effective for removal of overseeded cool-season grasses, and is highly selective in bermuda, zoysia, centipede and buffalo grasses, and seashore paspalum.

University trials have shown that it is effective in controlling Poa annua, ryegrass, clumpy ryegrass, Poa trivialis, tall fescue and annual ryegrass in warm-season turf.

The labeling permits the herbicide to be used on golf courses and professionally managed sports fields, and on the following turf areas: industrial parks, tank farms, sod farms, seed farms, cemeteries. For residential turf grass, Katana can be applied on up to 10 percent of a lawn through targeted or spot treatment with spray directed on the weeds.