LAWN

                                  Lawn Care 101

There are Three major factors to keeping your Lawn looking Green and Healthy all through the season.

1. Water - Water - Water
And not necessarily more of it. Watering the correct amount is key to having a nice lawn. The problem is we usually set the sprinkler clock then ignore it for the rest of the year.

Too much water in the spring promotes fungus issues. However if you get behind and your turf isn't hydrated when the heat hits, you will have a terrible time catching up.
Two good rules that are easy to implement.

Your lawn should be dry by nightfall - fungus needs moisture to grow, so watering the early A.M. with the turf being dry by nightfall really helps prevent fungus.

Water less often but for longer periods of time, i.e. instead of watering every day for 15 minutes a day water three times a week for 45 minutes  (rotor set; goes round and round or 20 minutes on a pop-up, just pops up and waters in all directions at once.)

When to adjust - depends on the weather; if the lying weather man states it is going to get 20 degrees hotter at the end of the week - dial the water up NOW, before it gets hot. BUT; bring the watering time down when the heat is past. Never guess but always use a water meter to see how wet it really is getting each day.

2. Fertilizer
That pretty green color is only going to be visible if you are feeding the lawn with nitrogen. The new Spread it and Forget it product is nice because it applies more nitrogen throughout the year and I strongly recommend it.

However if you are on a standard program you should fertilize less more often. Over Fertilizing can burn a  lawn (pulls moisture off the roots) and puts more stress on the turf.

Nitrogen leeches (goes through dirt) fast and often your grass roots do not have time to absorb it before the sprinklers push the nitrogen through the ground (into our ground water). So it is better to do more applications but with less product so the grass has a chance to absorb it. You'll also not have that fast growth that makes lawn mowing so tough.

Keep in mind that if the label and analysis called for 3lbs of fertilizer per 1000 square feet; that was estimating a 6 week cycle. So if you want to do it every 2 weeks you need to cut the product down to 1lb per thousand square feet.

How much? That depends on the analysis Click Here For Link.
And for Calibrating (setting your spreader) Click Here for Link
FOR A TRUE ORGANIC FERTILIZER I DO OFFER A COMPOST TEA CLICK HERE


3. MowingYour grass is happier without a short haircut. So you can start at  2 1/2 inches in the spring but when the heat hits take it up to 3 inches. You'll be surprised how much this helps. In the fall you can mow it lower to help prevent snow mold during the winter.

Email me if you want more information; please include your area or city