Essential Lawn care

With spring fast approaching our garden maintenance team are at the ready to help keep your gardens in tip top condition throughout the coming season. From weeding to pruning, grass cutting to strimming, they are a talented bunch who know how to care for your garden properly. However, if you want some insider essential lawn care tips to help you look after your own grass, here are some of our trade secrets…

Our professional maintenance team can look after all your lawn needs

The essential tasks

The immediate effect of the essential tasks such as mowing, watering, feeding and weeding is to keep the lawn looking attractive, but there is also a vital long-term effect. The vigour of the desirable grasses is maintained and increased so that unwelcome invaders such as weeds, moss and some diseases find it harder to gain a foothold.

Mow regularly

The number one essential task is correct mowing. This means beginning and ending at the proper time with the blades set at the correct height. Blades must be sharp and properly set.

Water

Water before the lawn turns brown: The first effect of drought is a loss of springiness and a general dullness of the turf. Look for these signs after about 7 days of dry weather during the summer. Water copiously; a light sprinkling every day can do more harm than good.

With a lot of TLC you can have a lovely lawn to enjoy

Trim the edges

A lawn with overgrown grass at the edges can be an eyesore. Make sure the mower can reach right up to the edge then trim around the edges. Make sure edging tools are clean and sharp.

Feed

Feeding is key to your essential lawn care tips. Feed with nitrogen-rich fertiliser in spring or early summer: The constant cropping of the grass foliage is a serious drain on the nutrient reserves in the soil, so a routine feed is essential at the early part of the growing season. Autumn feeding to build up the root system and increase disease resistance is a useful procedure. Ensure that you choose a treatment that is intended for autumn use.

Nice edging gives the lawn a sharp look

Rake

Rake during the spring and again in the autumn: Raking the lawn with a spring-tine rake has several benefits. The build-up of thatch is prevented and surface debris is removed. The removal of fallen leaves in autumn is essential – never leave them on the lawn surface over winter. Raking up creeping stems of weeds before mowing helps with their control.

Remove worm casts

Worm casts should never be ignored. When squashed underfoot the surface is rendered uneven and the bare earth makes an ideal seed bed for weeds. When casts appear scatter them with a besom or stiff broom before mowing and removing the clippings using a grass box. Using a treatment such as Castclear can help prevent worm casts without harming the worms.

Weed killing

Kill weeds and moss when they appear: Don’t wait until the problem gets out of hand. Occasional weeds can be pulled out by hand and occasional patches of moss indicate that the growing conditions have to be improved. By keeping on top of weeds and moss you can avoid the need to add nasty chemicals to the lawn.

Aerate the lawn

The lawn is aerated by driving a fork or other spiked instrument at intervals so as to relieve compaction – drainage is improved and new growth is stimulated. Aerate at least once a year if the ground is badly compacted and moss is present.

Aerating your lawn will help keep bogginess at bay

Top dress the lawn

Top dressing is the application of a bulky mixture, usually made up of peat, loam and sand. This dressing should be ap[plied every autumn, and it is an essential technique if you want a really first rate lawn. The vigour of the grass is improved and minor hollows are removed.

For more essential lawn care tips read our blog Grass-ias.

Hopefully the above will be of use to you but should you require any help with your lawn please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Vialii

Grass-ias

We all want the perfect lawn in our gardens. A lovely, flat, weed-free, green space for playing and lounging on. But it isn’t very easy to achieve with all the weeds flying about and our wet weather and heavy soils. But, to help you get closer to that dream, I have collated my top tips for a lovely lawn this summer..

Lulu loves lounging on a lovely lawn!

Scarify your lawn

You can add a moss killer to your lawn but you don’t need to. Just use your muscles and a good garden rake to get the moss out of your lawn. I used my Twigz rake which was perfect for the job (£8.99*)

You need good muscles to rake up your moss

You can put the moss into your compost bin. My Twigz wheelbarrow is incredibly sturdy and perfect for this job (£49.99*)

Collect your moss and put it on your compost bin

Weed Your Lawn

Lawn weeds can be a real pain. You can buy weedkiller to put on the lawn or you can use old fashioned muscle and dig up the offenders! Regular weeding is key so they don’t take over and leave no space for the grass to grow.

Tackle those weeds using a trowel and some muscles

Aerate your soil

If you have a heavy soil and a compacted lawn it makes it hard for the grass to grow well and thatch starts to build up. You can buy special tools to aerate your lawn or you can just use a garden fork to create the holes.

Tilda is an expert at aerating lawns!

Add a top dressing

You can add sand if you have clay soil or just a lawn improver to your lawn which will go into the holes you have made and improve the soil making the grass grow better. Use a brush like the Twigz garden broom (£8.99*) to spread the lawn improver around. You can add some grass seed to bare areas while you do this and some fertiliser too to give your grass a wee helping hand.

Brush your top dressing into the holes

Cut your grass

It’s always tempting to cut your grass very short to make it nice and neat but it’s not good for your lawn. Raise the level of your lawnmower and just give it a gentle trim or it will look bare and weeds will thrive instead of the grass. Little and often is the secret. How cute is this Flying Bee Lawnmower from Bigjigs? I love using it on my lawn and Tilda loves the bee which flies off into the air. (£32.99*)

Don’t set your lawn mower too low when you cut your grass

Grass-ias! If all that seems like a bit too much hard work and you would rather just lie back and enjoy your garden while others did the work for you then contact us to arrange a quote for us to do your lawn treatments and grass cutting for you!

Lulu xx

*Prices correct at time of publication