The decades of work advancing our understanding and building resources for model organisms enable scientists to move quickly from hypotheses to conclusions. However, few well-developed model organisms cause as much real-world harm or actively hinder agriculture as weeds. Herbicide-resistant agricultural weeds pose one of the greatest threats to modern agriculture’s ability to deliver sufficient food sustainably. Despite this impact, we have little understanding of their biology, let alone which genes or pathways confer their weediness. The unique combination of natural and anthropogenic selection pressures imposed by modern agriculture means weeds exhibit unique traits and have genomes, including extra-chromosomal circular DNA, that differ from model, crop, or wild plant species. Therefore, to understand how weeds’ weedy traits have evolved, are regulated, and confer selective advantage in the agroecosystem, we must holistically study them as resilient and adaptable plants. Our lab is undertaking functional genomics alongside molecular and physiological analysis of weeds, comparing them with the crops they infest, to fill knowledge gaps about their biology and genetics. Our aim is to derive a mechanistic understanding of the traits that allow weeds to circumvent otherwise lethal stresses. By studying weeds and their weedy traits, we will 1) identify exploitable weaknesses for effective and sustainable weed control, and 2) learn what confers their resilience and gain knowledge with which to future-proof our staple crops. In the Art of War, Sun Tzu wrote “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”