Feeding a lawn is a relatively simple operation, but so many get it wrong, or do it when it it not necessary! Here's how and when to do it; and what to use.
Each of the aspects are important. Do it at the wrong time and you could end up with a weakened lawn. Use the wrong feed and scorching or unhealthy grass can result.
The process that causes most problems, is simply that of putting your fertiliser on the grass! Uneven application leads to a patch lawn at best, and a ruined lawn at worst!
For most, the safest fertiliser would be one of the brand names on sale at your garden centre or supplier. It stands to reason that the big brands have much experience in providing as fail-safe as possible, a product for turning your grass green without too many hiccups unless you ignore their instructions!
Garden Grass and Ponder Seat
Most established and cared-for lawns will only need a dedicated feed rather than a combined feed, weed and moss-kill variation. If you do not have weeds, or moss, there is nothing to be gained by trying to kill them! On the contrary, it can be argued quite forcibly that you are just throwing chemical at the environment.
If you have a weed problem that cannot be sorted by spot treatment, then a combined fertiliser weed-kill is the route to go. You may have no option, for many garden centres seem to major on stocking the 3 in 1 version!
If your lawn has been invaded by moss often visible after the first cut or so, then you can uses a combined feed and moss application. The moss application is a short term measure you need to do something about the root cause of moss in lawns.
If you only want feed and want a dig at the garden centre then use cheaper and environmental-friendly chicken pellets!
There are chemicals other than dedicated lawn fertilisers that can be used. Here we talk about reliability and tried and tested methods!
There are 100's of products on the market, each one, the next best thing since sliced bread. They come in either granular or soluble form, just user preference. Some products are pet friendly, check each lable.
What is important is the fact, is it fit for purpose? Detailed below is When do you feed your Lawn? Different seasons require different methods. For best results, follow the guidelines.
This Miracle-Gro Water Soluble Lawn Food is easy to apply with a sprayer or watering can. It provides all the nutrients your lawn needs to grow healthy and green as well as encouraging the growth of side shoots for a thick green lawn. Feeding with this product will improve the health of your lawn and the grass will then crowd out weeds and moss, too.
This EverGreen Miracle-Gro Complete 4-in-1 Food is the best lawn feed your lawn if you also want it to kill weeds and moss in addition to improving your lawn’s ability to cope with heat and drought.
This Scotts Lawn Builder Lawn Food provides easily absorbed nutrients to green up your lawn in as little as seven days while also including slow release fertilisers that will keep it well nourished for up to eight weeks. The granular product can be applied by hand or with a spreader. There is no need to water it in unless the weather is very dry.
This Vitax Green Up Liquid Lawn Feed is great for the lawn as well as eliminating weeds, and one pack provides enough to cover 200 sq. m. The liquid formula is diluted with water and can be applied with a watering can or sprayer.
There other products available from all major outlets.
Every lawn is different. You will need to assess the type of lawn you have and want, and then prepare a feeding regime to fit. Generally there are three main feeding seasons recommended (by others). Spring, summer and autumn! Forget any type of feeding during the winter months. Each of those seasons will be dependent upon where you live and also the climatic variations.
There seems to be an automatic reaction that lawns have to be fed in the spring. This is not always the case, and is generally though necessary because of the colour of the grass (stalks) after a severe cut to a lawn that has been allowed to grow unchecked through the winter, and maybe did not get it last few cuts in previous October/November.
If you mow an overgrown lawn, it is going to appear yellowish and starved of food, simply because you are exposing the lower foliage which has not see light of day for a few months. It will be blanched because of lack of light.
Dont rush the fertiliser if this is the reality of your situation. Most lawns will naturally recover their greenery after two or three cuts!
Likewise with weed applications; they should be allowed to grow a little before applying a weed and feed. After the third weekly cut which will normally take you through to the end of April, is a good time to assess if your lawn requires feeding, and in the event that it does, then apply sooner rather than later. The soil is normally moist at this time, whereas going into May, it can start to dry out rapidly.
If the ground is dry, delay feeding until rain has dampened it again.
In the hotter, drier weather, lawns will naturally lose that fresh green carpet look unless you are generous with the sprinkler. It may be that your yellowing lawn is simply as a result of hot dry weather, rather than lack of food. Most lawns even if they turn brown, will soon recover after they have been rained upon.
If you decide that a feed is necessary, then try to time it just before rain. If the expected rain does not happen, then you will need to water the lawn so as to avoid chemical scorch from the fertiliser. In spite of its name, scorch does not happen because it is hot. It happens because the soil is dry, the neat chemicals are resting on or near the grasses, and the typical scorched appearance will be the result.
Summer will see my mail box full of queries about brown patches on the lawn. Nine times out of ten, it is caused by the incorrect application of lawn feed!
That which is sold for autumn feeding, is a different chemical balance to that used for spring and summer application. It is used to restore balance to the plants system. All spring and summer, the feeding regime will have been to encourage foliage which you then cut off with the mower. The plant inherently becomes weaker as a result, so needs strengthening up again to face winter!
The word of the scribes and manufacturers is that the autumn feed is most important to feed the root system and generally toughen up the grass plants to withstand the cold of winter!
If it is applied, the autumn feed should not be left too late. End of September or into a mild October is fine. DO NOT be tempted to use the Nitrogen-rich leftovers from spring and summer. Use a proper autumn feed.
Nothing other than Autumn Lawn Feed should be used, unless you know what you are doing. Organic feeds oftain provide Nitrogen. It is NOT needed in the Autumn, so forget chicken pellets and the like.
Read the instructions on the packaging well and do exactly as it says! There are slight differences between some brands chemicals, so it is important that you comply with the recommendations.
At all times the soil should be moist for feed application. If parched dry, then far better to delay applications until rain has rectified the situation, rather than relying on the sprinkler especially if there is a ban.
In late spring, don't let surface dew fool you into thinking the soil is moist! Dew is essentially on the foliage of the grass it is not in the soil.
Pressure Sprayer, 5 L
Autumn Lawn Care
Seed Spreader
Grass Seed
Maxicrop Moss Killer
Pressure Sprayer, 5 L
Seed Spreader
The First Cut
The spring season is an important time for getting your lawn into top shape for the following months. What you do now in the spring by way of lawn care, will determine how well your lawn will cope with the wear and tear of day to day use, and also its ability to withstand drought or even water-logging during the summer months.
Lawn Care Main
Lawns take up a lot of time compared with most aspects of the garden. In spite of the time and care lavished upon lawns, many fail to live up to expectations. Maybe the expectations are too great to start with. Problem being, that next door and surrounding areas seem to have better lawns!
Throwing money at an established lawn or patch of straw is not always the best way forward - neither the most successful in terms of attaining the quality lawn that you want. It is always a good ide to take a step backward, to see what the problem really is with the lawn. More often than not it will be something to do with your lawn care regime.
Lawn Aeration
Not all lawns need aeration; but most do! Soil Compaction drives air out of the soil. A garden lawn is probably the most hostile environment provided by gardeners in furtherance of obtaining a beautiful garden. This is one reason for aerating a lawn. No other plant / grass are subjected to such willful abuse than the grass on the garden lawn, it needs care!
Top Dressing Lawns
Top Dressing of Lawns is beneficial. It encourages new basal growth of the grass plants - giving a thicker sward of grass. Top Dressing is also a good way to 'level out' the bumps and hollows in an uneven lawn.
Top dressing is normally carried out in mid spring. It can be done at any time in the growing season (March-October), but a dressing in the spring soon 'disappears' under the resultant lush lawn growth. Earlier in the growing season - but not in the autumn - a suitable fertiliser or feed can be added to the top dressing to give that little bit extra.
Lawn Problems
There are many and varied problems associated with keeping a good - or even reasonable - lawn. Quite often the problems are caused by something quite simple. That is, if you know what to look for! Describing a lawn problem seems to be beyond many of the people who write emails to me for help. A brown spot is a brown spot is it not? Well, err no, not always.
Bumps in the Lawn
Ok! Let's get one thing right, straight away. You do not get a level lawn by using a roller. Using a roller, simply gives you hard bumps and hard hollows - and all the bits in between.
In fact, unless you are going to carry out all of the other operations necessary for a first class lawn, you can get rid of the roller altogether - although I might concede that it is useful for a light run over before the first cut after the winter.
Brown Patches in Lawns
There are several causes of brown patches on lawns and other bare areas on the lawn, some are outlined below... Broadly, lawn brown patches can be split into three categories - depending upon the size of the patch. Recognising the size and shape of the patch - simple you might think - can go a long way in identifying the cause of the brown patch. I have had mails in the past where the write has claimed to have brown patches on the lawn, when in fact the entire lawn was brown - killed off by the wrong use of a certain weedkiller!
Lawn Moss Killer
If you really want to eradicate moss from your lawn, then you have to find out the actual problem that is causing it, rather than just treating it. The reasons are various, but not too difficult to isolate.
They can be one or several of the causes outlined below.
The latter is also available as a ready to use 'Moss Gun' for small patches. Neither do anything by way of treating the basic problem of moss in lawns. They simply are simply Lawn Moss Treatments - killing the moss which is there. It will return. You can alsouse lawn sand
Moles in your Lawn
Moles are one of the most frustrating of all garden and lawn pests! They are rarely seen, but can cause absolute mayhem. The damage they do to plants is minimal, but if you are unfortunate enough to have moles in your garden, they will cause you more angst than an infestation of aphids! The main problem being, that they are so difficult to get rid of, and you normally see the damage they do, before you realize that you have a mole or so!
Cute little things they might be, but if your lawn is your pride an joy, or if it is just a nice lawn to sit and relax, the molehill trademark will soon turn you against them! One mole can wreak havoc in the garden, but a few and you have a potential disaster.
Fairy Rings in Lawns and Turf
Fairy rings in lawns normally start to show up in late spring or mid-summer. They then carry on growing right through until the autumn and usually into subsequent years. They are easily recognised by either of two or both trademarks. Once they have started, they will be visible throughout the year.
They are most commonly seen as dark green circles of lush grass in the lawn usually after they are a half a metre or so across, though they are visible at first as a tuft of dark green grass.
The Fairy rings may also be first noticed as a group of toadstools manifest in mid-summer. (Sometimes without the dark green grass!) Not all toadstools in the lawn are as a result of Fairy Rings.
Dogs Fouling Lawns | General problems
The main problem with dogs on lawns is that of the brown patches caused by bitches urinating. Male dogs are not such a problem in this respect, for they do it differently..
The brown patches tend to be a circular patch with bright green grass growing around the perimeter as the bitches urine eventually breaks down to Nitrogen, which then feeds the area outside the actual damage. The brown patch is basically scorching - similar to that caused by applying too much fertilizer - especially in dry conditions.
Treatment by soaking the area with water - immediately after the bitch has done the deed! Soaking the brown patches after they have formed will be absolutely essential if you are going to over-seed the patches.
Lawn and Garden Edging
Garden lawns have to stop at some point, often causing a minor problem as to how to end or edge your garden with your lawn. Much will depend upon the style of your garden, but you will also have to take into account basic things like, the type of lawn mower you want to use, and even the basics of, how much time do you want to spend giving your lawn a neat finish!
It is not normally a good idea to simply end your lawn at the boundary of your garden edge; against a wall or fence. This will inevitably lead to either additional maintenance work - or an untidy finish, where the mower blade cannot quite get to the edges of the turf at the garden border edge.
Feeding Lawns
Feeding a lawn is a relatively simple operation, but so many get it wrong, or do it when it it not necessary! Here's how and when to do it; and what to use.
Each of the aspects are important. Do it at the wrong time and you could end up with a weakened lawn. Use the wrong feed and scorching or unhealthy grass can result.
The process that causes most problems, is simply that of putting your fertiliser on the grass! Uneven application leads to a patch lawn at best, and a ruined lawn at worst!
Lawn Thoughts
The big sign outside the garden store commanded WINTERIZE YOUR LAWN.
I've fed the lawn: I've watered the lawn: I've mowed the lawn: raked it and watched a lot of it die anyway. Now I'm supposed to winterize my lawn? I hope it's not too late.
Grass lawns have to be the stupidest thing we've come up with outside of the IRS! We constantly battle dandelions, Queen Anne's lace, thistle, violets, chicory and clover that thrive naturally, so we can grow grass that must be nursed through an annual four-step chemical dependency.
