What Should I Do for My Lawn Right Now – A Season by Season Lawn Care Guide

What Should I Do for My Lawn Right Now – A Season by Season Lawn Care Guide

Nothing beats waking up every morning to the smell of a fresh, green and healthy lawn. Walking on your grass sans footwear is a feeling unlike any other. However, making sure that the grass on your yard stays lush and green from all year round will require plenty of regular maintenance. Yes, it takes a lot of hard work and you always have the option of hiring professional lawn experts to do it for you, but there are times when you need to do the work yourself. With that said, here are a few tips that will help make sure that your lawn stays fresh and green for a long time.

Start in Early Spring

Just like with any kind of maintenance job, lawn care requires a lot of preparation if you want things to go smoother. Early spring is usually the time when homeowners all across the country prepare their lawns for the growing and mowing season. Once your grass has started to grow, sharpen the blades of your lawn mower to ensure cleaner and more precise cuts. Dull lawn mowing blades can will tear the grass and leave your lawn with plenty of jagged edges that can discolor it and make it prone to pathogens.

It is recommended to sharpen your lawn mower blades at least once a month during the grass cutting season. You should also keep a spare blade or two with you just in case. You can usually find extra blades at your local home improvement store for no more than $20.

Your mower also needs to be tuned up every once in a while, so be sure to spend some money for a new air filter and sparkplug. You won’t necessarily have to change your mower’s sparkplug every year, but changing it is quite a simple task. Doing it every year will also help remind you of the last time you changed your sparkplug.

If you have some gas leftover from the winter, you might want to replace that with some fresh gas. Gas that’s been left to sit during the winter season will usually accumulate moisture which can damage small engines. Fuel containing ethanol is especially guilty of this, so try to avoid it if you can.

The end of the winter season can leave your lawn with more than a few twigs and leaves lying around. The snow and overall cold weather can moisten these leaves, which can suffocate your lawn if they are not removed quickly in early spring. Removing stones, twigs and other old debris will make it easier for you to apply fertilizer and herbicide on your yard.

Summer    

Early in the summer, you’ll want to be mindful of grub worms. These are the larvae of Japanese and June beetles, and they love to feed on the root systems of your lawn. You’ll know whether or not your lawn has a grub infestation problem as soon as you see brown patches and wilting. If you want to ascertain that grubs are indeed the cause of your lawn’s worries, pull the sod back and try searching for white small, C-shaped grubs. You’ll need to apply some chemical pesticide on your lawn if you see more than 10 of these critters per square foot.

The grass on your lawn will also be growing more rapidly during the summer, and you may find yourself cutting your grass more than once a week trying to catch up. Mow regularly to keep your grass healthy and remember to remove no more than 1/3 of the grass blade during each mow. Use a garden fork to remove any weeds that you see, and only use a post-emergent herbicide if the weed infestation in your lawn starts to become too much for you to handle.

When mowing your lawn, be sure to have your blade height set to 3 inches. This ensures a more precise cut. The summer heat can be detrimental to your lawn, so you’ll need to water it regularly. A general rule of thumb is to provide your lawn with an inch of water each week. Your lawn will go dormant if you give it less than the required amount of water per week.

Grass clippings, also known as mulch, is helpful because they can nourish your soil once they start to decompose. However, you should remove any large clumps of grass clippings that you see because they might suffocate some parts of your lawn. Use a rake to clean up any sticks, twigs and leaves that you see on your lawn.

The Fall

No lawn will ever stay perfect and you might see a few thin or bare spots here and there. You’re aching to clean them up, but you might want to hold off on that until the fall comes. It is much easier to work on your lawn once the summer heat gradually goes away and gives way to cooler temperature. There should be some dead grass on your soil around this time, so try to remove as much as you can.

Using a garden towel, break up the soil and add an inch of compost to it afterwards. Be sure to work this compost into the soil. Get some grass seeds that are designed for full sun or shade, and evenly spread them across the bare patch on your lawn. The seed needs to be buried at least half an inch into the soil, so use a hard-tooth rake to get this job done.

To keep the soil from drying out, remember to use some grass clippings on the bare patch. Keep the patch moist by watering it lightly at least once a day. Do this until the seed germinates and your new grass grows at least an inch tall.

The fall or autumn season will also bring about some dead leaves falling from your trees, so you’ll need to focus much of your time in trying to remove them from your lawn. These leaves can suffocate your lawn and end up killing the grass.

If you want more lawn care tips from us at Lawn Love, give our blog page a visit.

Sara Butler

Sara Butler has written scores of articles for Lawn Love -- everything from how to revive your dead lawn to how to start to lawn care tools every homeowner should have.