Question:
<< Comments? Lawn envy can be frighteningly expensive. Cash out part of your retirement savings now, sell your current car and buy an early ’90’s Honda, get a major home equity loan and have at it. Call the pros and have the entire area paved with pure bluegrass sod. If you can’t find it in your area, widen your search to find a place that has it. A semi load of the best should about do the job, but don’t stint on it. Install the finest metered sprinkler system you can find. For the water volume needed you may have to have your service upgraded to a larger size pipe, so do that first before the sod goes on. Good luck and happy mowing. Joe
Response:
I need to aerate the soil. How can I accomplish this without a full fledged aerator designed for a riding lawnmower? Also, need suggestions for broadleaf control. (Cloverleaf, dandelions, etc) The guy at Lowe’s suggested Weed and Feed.
Rent a walk behind aerator. If the weeds are not completely out of control, just walk around your yard with a handheld ‘windex’ type sprayer, and spray the weeds with weed-b-gon. You will do the same job without using up massive amounts of chemicals. Bob
Response:
Candeh, Different soils and different climates will dictate different answers. Check with your local government for an agricultural extension agency. Have the ag exten do a soil test. Advice that does not address your area may be worthless to you. There is at least one lawn newsgroup. Bob’s advice to rent an aerator is good. Good luck, Dave M.
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – This regards a .33 acre lawn. I’ve applied a fertilizer guaranteed not to burn. (Can’t remember the nitrogen rating.) I’ve put down quite a bit of pelletized lime. Grass is green as hell. Problem is, I just have a push mower. I need to aerate the soil. How can I accomplish this without a full fledged aerator designed for a riding lawnmower? Also, need suggestions for broadleaf control. (Cloverleaf, dandelions, etc) The guy at Lowe’s suggested Weed and Feed. And, if I decided that I wanted to re-seed the lawn with a better grass, would I just have to seed it over the existing lawn? Would it crowd out the "mutt" grass that is there now? I guess what I’m trying to say is that I want my lawn to be the most kick ass piece of greenery on the block. The fertilizer has worked wonders, I mean like, if you walk on my grass you’ve got green dye on your shoes. I want my lawn to look like a purebred carpet of greenery that people will hesitate to step foot on it looks so good. Anybody got some good tips for me? A lot of the neighbors have the same crew come out and cut their grass, do edging, etc. But they’re not lawn specialists, per se. I want my lawn to look so good that those guys stand around with their hands on their hips, pointing and commenting on how damn good my lawn looks. I want it to look SWEET. Help? Comments? candeh
Response:
<< Thanks dude You’re welcome. And as I gaze out at my mixture of crabgrass, watergrass, clover, spurge, creeping charlie, violets, plantains and dandelions, and other Feed’m ‘n Weed’m resistant flora… Yeah, I’m envious. Joe
Response:
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – This regards a .33 acre lawn. I’ve applied a fertilizer guaranteed not to burn. (Can’t remember the nitrogen rating.) I’ve put down quite a bit of pelletized lime. Grass is green as hell. Problem is, I just have a push mower. I need to aerate the soil. How can I accomplish this without a full fledged aerator designed for a riding lawnmower? Also, need suggestions for broadleaf control. (Cloverleaf, dandelions, etc) The guy at Lowe’s suggested Weed and Feed. And, if I decided that I wanted to re-seed the lawn with a better grass, would I just have to seed it over the existing lawn? Would it crowd out the "mutt" grass that is there now? I guess what I’m trying to say is that I want my lawn to be the most kick ass piece of greenery on the block. The fertilizer has worked wonders, I mean like, if you walk on my grass you’ve got green dye on your shoes. I want my lawn to look like a purebred carpet of greenery that people will hesitate to step foot on it looks so good. Anybody got some good tips for me? A lot of the neighbors have the same crew come out and cut their grass, do edging, etc. But they’re not lawn specialists, per se. I want my lawn to look so good that those guys stand around with their hands on their hips, pointing and commenting on how damn good my lawn looks. I want it to look SWEET. Help? Comments? candeh
After 11 years in the lawn care business I can tell you that you would be best advised to do some serious investigation into lawns before you continue. Every spring I would face a handful of potential customers who would show me their lawn and say " this used to be the greenest lawn on the street" and as we looked at their mottled, diseased patch of turf I would have to inform them that the solution to their problems would take a couple of seasons at least. Firstly you do not want to stimulate growth in your lawn at this time of year. Forcing it to green up in the summer is a very dangerous proposition and one that will eventually lead to fungal diseases in the soil. Most of what you do to a lawn, fertilization and weed control etc, is done in the spring and fall when it is cooler and your lawn is growing. Summer fertilization and weed control, if done at all, should be very mild. You also don’t aerate your lawn in the summer as you would be exposing the root system to the heat of the sun and potentially damaging them. Before you come back w/ " well the golf courses keep their grass green all summer" I would say that they are cultivating different grasses than you would be and they are also laying down fungicides to control the infections. You don’t want to get into fungicides on a domestic lawn. Pick up some reading material before you continue, or hire a professional company to care for the property for you if you don’t want to spend the time investigating the area. Don’t mean to sound pessimistic, but I’ve seen lots of disasters and thought you could use some sound advice before you continued. Peter H
Response:
Neil Sperry, the local (DFW) gardening expert suggests pump-up tank sprayers with a broadleafed weed killer containing 2,4-D. He hates weed and feed products, and for that matter if you just fertilized you certainly don’t need more. Remember to read the label of the broadleafed weed killer to make sure it is usable in your type of lawn. As for seeding over an existing lawn, the new seed would have to create grass that is much stronger than the old grass, in order for it to eventually crowd it out, even then it would take a long time. If you want a ‘new’ lawn, best to get rid of the old one and start over.
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – This regards a .33 acre lawn. I’ve applied a fertilizer guaranteed not to burn. (Can’t remember the nitrogen rating.) I’ve put down quite a bit of pelletized lime. Grass is green as hell. Problem is, I just have a push mower. I need to aerate the soil. How can I accomplish this without a full fledged aerator designed for a riding lawnmower? Also, need suggestions for broadleaf control. (Cloverleaf, dandelions, etc) The guy at Lowe’s suggested Weed and Feed. And, if I decided that I wanted to re-seed the lawn with a better grass, would I just have to seed it over the existing lawn? Would it crowd out the "mutt" grass that is there now? I guess what I’m trying to say is that I want my lawn to be the most kick ass piece of greenery on the block. The fertilizer has worked wonders, I mean like, if you walk on my grass you’ve got green dye on your shoes. I want my lawn to look like a purebred carpet of greenery that people will hesitate to step foot on it looks so good. Anybody got some good tips for me? A lot of the neighbors have the same crew come out and cut their grass, do edging, etc. But they’re not lawn specialists, per se. I want my lawn to look so good that those guys stand around with their hands on their hips, pointing and commenting on how damn good my lawn looks. I want it to look SWEET. Help? Comments? candeh