6 End-of-Summer Weeds You May Want to Identify Before Pulling

Late-summer weeds such as ragweed, purslane, lambsquarters, pigweed, broadleaf plantain and pokeweed have distinctive features worth checking before removal – Shutterstock

Late summer can reveal the plants that spent June and July quietly plotting a takeover. Before grabbing the garden gloves and yanking every unfamiliar green thing from the soil, take a closer look, because some weeds deserve a proper identification first.

A few may irritate allergies, some can produce an astonishing number of seeds, and others can cause trouble simply because they look harmless until their roots settle in. A quick ID can also prevent the classic gardening mistake of pulling one plant while leaving its much more troublesome lookalike behind.