Tag Archives: lawn and garden

Gardening Advice, Landscaping

Five Easy Lawn Care Tips

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We all want the perfect lawn. It is not as difficult as you think. The right planning and these five tips can help you get the lawn you want. All grasses need the same things; fertilizer, water, sunlight and a weed-free environment. Start in the fall or early spring with proper testing. Also make sure to check your specific type of grass for special growing requirements and use these tips and get ready for a great lawn.

Test Your Soil: All grasses need food to live. They also need the right conditions. Performing the proper testing and fertilization are keys to a lush lawn. The right pH levels and levels of nitrogen and other trace elements are the most crucial. All garden stores carry an inexpensive testing kit that gives you a basic measure of these nutrients. However, these are generally inaccurate and provide little in the way of help fixing any deficiencies. Instead try a local university. Most provide a detailed analysis of soil, highlight deficiencies with exactly how to fix them.

Proper Mowing: A sharp blade and the right lawn length are also key to a healthy lawn. Each type of grass has slightly different requirements but, in general, you want to keep your grass about 3″-4″ in length. Any shorter and you may damage the grass by cutting too much and allow weeds to take root. Keeping the blade sharp minimizes damage to the plants and can reduce the incidence of disease and pests.

Lawn Fertilizer: In addition to preseason testing and fertilization the end of the growing season is key. As grasses begin to overwinter the roots require increased levels of potassium. This allows them to remain strong during the winter months and emerge sooner and stronger as a result. “Ensure you do not over-fertilize your lawn as it can be severely damaging and cause burns and even plant death,” advises Nate Merchant who performs Landscape Design in Morris County NJ. Always reference and follow strict instructions and guidelines.

Watering Your Lawn: All grasses need water but different types have different requirements. Warmer season grasses go dormant earlier than the cooler varieties and require less water. Generally most grasses need water about once a week. Long, infrequent watering is preferable since it requires roots to travel deeper in the soil between watering which strengthen the plant. The time of day is important as well. Try watering in the early part of the day. This prevents burning your lawn in the hot sun and allows the grass to dry before the evening when fungus can set in.

Keeping Disease and Pests Away: The sad truth is that nobody is safe from pests and disease effecting their lawn. Disease and fungus can spread very quickly and be devastating to lawns if not identified and treated quickly. Keep and eye out for any strange patches or changes to your lawns color. Call an expert or visit a garden store at the first sign of a problem. You can reduce the incidence of these problems by keeping weeds at bay with a herbicide applied in the spring and fall.

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Gardening

Get The Help You Need On Composting

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Composting is a way to create an awesome soil improver for your lawn or garden. But does it seem there are lots of confusing rules? Like don’t stick tomatoes in the pile but do put in veggies scraps. Or don’t empty your cat’s litter box but do use cow manure. Grass clippings are good just not too many.

If such do’s and don’ts are the reason you’ve shied away from adding a backyard compost why don’t we see if we can help you get past that.

Composting Defined: A natural process that encourages the decay of organic matter such as kitchen scraps, yard waste or leaves into a natural soil enhancer.

This really is an excellent little yard waste recycling system. In fact let me share three reasons to compost.

Composting this kind of organic waste gives you a cheap way to improve the quality of soil in your garden immensely. Plus it is a practical way to dispose of household waste saving landfill space. Also by composting you reduce the need for commercial fertilizers which are chemically based and do little to improve your dirt.

Just about anything plant based such as grass clippings, to kitchen scraps like potato peels and apple cores, to coffee grounds and tea bags can be composted. Those contribute the nitrogen element to the pile. If it helps think green. As a lot of these will be green in color.

Woody materials like leaves in the fall to sawdust even wood chips can also be composted. That’s the carbon component. With this you want to think brown.

Mixing the green and brown, or technically the nitrogen and carbon, is what it takes to speed up the process of breaking down the ingredients. Those who lack enough green to heat things up can always add nitrogen heavy lawn fertilizer or household ammonia even.

Having spelled out what to use you want to avoid the following:

Any dairy items, meat, bones, grease, or fatty foods like cheese ought not be added to the pile. Such stuff slows down decomposition and attracts unwanted rodents. Stuff like that an also be the source of unpleasant odors.

Dog and cat droppings should also not be composted as doing so can spread disease.

Avoid adding diseased plants or weeds that have gone to seed to the pile. The seeds may not be killed off. Which means you’ll simply be sowing them as you spread the compost next year.

Same goes for tomatoes and morning glories. Do heed the morning glory warning. Or you’ll regret all the volunteers that come up year after year – for years.

Locating the pile isn’t a big deal. Try to keep it convenient for you yet close to the garden if you can. You want the sun to hit it some to help heat up the pile. And being somewhat sheltered from the wind is good too.

In any case this should give you some ideas of what to pay attention to when setting up your pile. Which at it’s most basic simply comes down to brown and green. Get it even close to right and within 12 months Mother Nature will present you with some handsomely rich mulch to spread around.

And for anyone looking to learn more about John Deere used zero turn lawn mowers, or who wants to know which is better lawn tractors or garden tractors, or who seeks some best riding mowers reviews, then MowerMania.com is the site for you. You’ll find it has the plenty of ideas and advice. Or just you’re looking for about lawn care but couldn’t find.

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