Lambs Tongue (Plantago lanceolata)

Lambs Tongue, also known as Ribwort or Buckhorn Plantain, is a common perennial weed of turf and lawns found in all areas of Australia.

Buckhorn Plantain, is a weed that you should really try and keep out of your turf. It has a large root, is hard to kill, and relatively drought tolerant.

Individual weeds form dense populations that compete with desirable turf species. Once it establishes, Lambs Tongue produces seed and spreads vegetatively. The seeds contaminate equipment and then spread to new areas.

In turf, Lambs Tongue may form dense clumps that damage and reduce usability of turgrass areas. It overwinters as a rosette, and the leaf base, root crown or short underground stem act as storage organs.

Buckthorn plantain is an Indicator Weed of dry, low fertility soils, but it also tolerates drought and wide range of environmental conditions.

Our Weed ID Chart has more information on common turf and grass weeds. The distribution map of Lambs Tongue is courtesy of The Living Atlas of Australia.

How to Identify Lambs Tongue.

Buckhorn Plantain is easy to identify as it has distinct slender parallel veins on hairy leaves that form 1 or more rosettes. However, at the seedling stage Ribwort Plantain appears similar to Wireweed.

Slender, long flowering stems emerge from these rosettes, which have dense, brown, cylindrical seed heads. These often have white anthers sticking out of them.

Because of its height, this weed quickly spreads via the wind. This weed germinates in the cooler months in the late Autumn and the early Winter. 

Photosynthetic Pathway. Lambs Tongue is a C3 weed, and has high frost tolerance.

Leaf length: Its leaves are long, narrow, and 3 to 30 cm long.

Leaf Width: The leaves are 8 to 30 mm wide.

Comments: You usually find Lambs Tongue is compact in turf but much more open and spreading in non-competitive situations.

Habitat: Buckhorn or Ribwort Plantain is often in poor lawns, turf, gardens, roadsides, and other high-traffic areas.

Cultural and chemical options will control Ribwort, Buckhorn Plantain or Lambs Tongue. Do realse however, that there is no 100% guaranteed cultural treatment that has been successful to control Lambs Tongue in turf grass.

Whatever cultural approach that you take you must continue with it for several years. If you don’t it is a waste of your time.

The first step is to outcompete it. Lambs Tongue is not a great competitor so if you maintain a thick, healthy turf cover it is a major step to manage this weed.

Make sure that you feed the turf properly and use the right turf fertilizer. This helps create a dense turf canopy that discourages Lambs Tongue. 

Crucial to creating a dense turf canopy is to make sure you mow at the right height for your turf type, as this also helps favour your turf over this weed.

The second step to control Lambs Tongue is to hand remove individual plants. If the weed isn’t too widespread, it is actually easy to remove it by hand, and early removal of seedlings works when you keep at it.

However, you must make sure that you pull out the whole plant, and this includes its deep tap root. If you don’t, it will regrow a short-time after you remove it.

Once these weeds are removed, renovate areas and manage them to establish a healthy turfgrass sward.

Chemical Control of Lambs Tongue.

Select a turf herbicide based on several criteria.

• The turf type that you have present.
• Cost and
• Ease of application.

It is very important to apply herbicides at the correct time and rate, and don’t be shy to spot spray Lambs Tongue if it is practical.

The best time to control weeds once they emerge from the soil, is when they are young and are actively growing. That time varies according to whether the weeds in question are cool-season weeds or warm-season weeds. Lambs Tongue is a cool-season weed.

Pre-emergent herbicides for Lambs Tongue.

Pre-emergent herbicides limit germination of Lambs Tongue in turf. They include those with the active ingredients Indaziflam, Isoxaben, and Mesotrione. These are not necessarily registered for this weed in Australia so always make sure that you read the label.

Overseas work has shown that Specticle herbicide does provide excellent control of Ribwort Plantain from seed. However, it does not control older Lambs Tongue plants.

Weeds such as Buckhorn Plantain that still have a living root system, will continue to grow through any ground where you apply Specticle.

Selective herbicides for Lambs Tongue.

There are three important points to bare in mind when it comes to the chemical control of Ribwort Plantain.

• The best time to spray this weed is when it’s young and not well established.
• Combinations of 2 or 3 active ingredients will give better control than if you just use one active ingredient and
• The best post emergent control of Lambs Tongue occurs with an Autumn herbicide application. You may need repeat hits to kill weakened perennial weeds and new seedlings.

Repeat applications of post emergent broadleaf herbicides will control Ribwort Plantain seedlings. However, once this weed matures control is more difficult, and products containing 2,4-D work best.

Other options for Lambs Tongue include Bromoxynil, Carfentrazone, Dicamba, Mesotrione, and Penoxsulam. The latter two are not currently registered in Australia for this weed.

Quinclorac gives reasonable control of Buckthorn Plantain but doesn’t work very well on Broadleaf Plantain.

Products based only on MCPA will only suppress, and not kill, Ribwort Plantain. Suitable options include:

• Casper Herbicide.
• Stature Herbicide.
• Quali-Pro Negate.
• ProForce Weed Blast MA.
• Warhead Trio.
• ProForce Contra M.

Non Selectives for Lambs Tongue.

These kill all vegetation and in the case of Numchuk, Renegade and Cortex Duo have a long term residual to prevent any regrowth.

• Renegade. This stops germinating weeds for up to 12 months, and reduces the need for multiple herbicide applications.
• Numchuk Quad.
• Cortex Duo.
• Rapid Fire 800. If you use Glyphosate and water quality is an issue then add Manta Ray spray adjuvant and pH buffer to your tank mix.