Its almost springtime in Edmonton Alberta at the time I wrote this. Many people are starting to switch gears from thinking about the long cold winter and the dreadful snow removal. Yard maintenance including lawn care is on many people’s minds now.
With my experience in lawn care and yard maintenance, I firmly believe that it is easy the achieve a lawn and yard that your friends and neighbors can be envious of. It all starts with a properly timed spring clean up and followed by proper mowing and watering of the lawn.
I am not sure why people insist on mowing their lawn so short. The leaf of the grass plant is what adds all the beauty to the lawn. Cutting off too much of the grass blade is about the equivalent to chopping all branches from a tree, not pretty. Mow the lawn about 3″, which is about double what many people actually cut at. This can be a hard transition to make for many people, but I assure you the rewards are worth making this switch.
The next easier part of lawn care and yard maintenance is stop bagging the grass clippings. These clippings hold a lot of water and fertilizer that you would be throwing away. Leave them on the lawn by using a mulching lawn mower and they will save not only your back by bagging them but will also save money on fertilizer and your water bill.
If these two things along with a common fertilizer and weed control program do not yield the perfect lawn, then I highly suggest a soil test. A soil test can reveal corrections needed to have healthy grass roots. Healthy grass roots will always equal healthy lawn.
In the fall as the grass begins to slow its growth this is the time to keep debris and leaves from the trees off the lawn. Now its the time to use the bag on the lawn mower, if there are too many leaves to mulch into the lawn. I prefer to continue mulch mowing weekly in the fall and only bag once or twice near the end when the leaves are too heavy to mulch them. Again by mulching the leaves your adding nutrients and organic matter into the soil and feeding the roots.
If these easy practices seem like too much or you would rather play golf then I would be happy to provide my yard maintenance services to you. Now that’s easy yard maintenance!