Lawn Care Advice

[justplugit]

Matt, aside from agreeing with Karl, try the following. Rent an overseeder slicer. It will slice the soil and drop the seed so it comes in contact with the soil which is necessary for germination.

Only Scotts products i use are their seed as they have good mixes for sun or shade, have a high germination rate and very low weed content.

Find a %50 organic or %50 WIN fert a 2-1-1 ratio, it will tell you on the bag. example 16-8-8 or 20-10-10 or even 10-6-4 which is close. Agway has excellent ferts.

After you seed,apply #40 pelitized lime 2500 sg ft. and fertilize at full rate on bag.

If you don't like cutting use the same fert at 1/2 the rate Memorial Day - Fourth of July and Labor Day which will keep it green and thick. Next year around St Patricks day start your fertilizer program.

Fertilzing at any other time will just increase the growth of crabgrass and broadleaf weeds. Spot kill the weeds with a sprayer in mid June after your seed has had a chance to germinate and has been cut at least 3 times.

Get a broadcast fertilizer spreader it will make things real easy.


Don't overwater= fungus.

[Mr. Sandman]

Scotts 4 step is the way to go. Supplement for problems as needed (grubs, insects fungus etc)Use their speedy green spreader too.

Organics are expensive, don't work most of the time and you have to put a TON of it on your lawn.


PS the 4 step is on sale now too..

[Raven]

Originally Posted by justplugit

Matt, aside from agreeing with Karl, try the following. Rent an overseeder slicer. It will slice the soil and drop the seed so it comes in contact with the soil which is necessary for germination.

Only Scotts products i use are their seed as they have good mixes for sun or shade, have a high germination rate and very low weed content.



Get a broadcast fertilizer spreader it will make things real easy.


Don't overwater= fungus.

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In the old days ...everyone had a water filled or solid concrete
roller in their backyard or had a deal to work out a share program with a neighbor.... this was so they literally pressed the grass seed into the soil making sure it had firm contact with the soil which encourages germination... (extremely important)

now a days people spread it with a spreader and water it to death without hardly even scratching it in... or they cover it with hay...

and the hydroseed companies have a much higher germination rate because their grass seed is pre germinated in their tanks and its sprayed down with a green moisture holding substance too.

the coolest thing i ever saw while working on golf courses was the finger hole maker which had a bank of tubes jamming them into the turf then popping out the plugs which you had to rake up and deposit elsewhere. Then you had a grass surface with thousands of finger sized holes , so we'd spread compost on top and lightly rake that back into the holes to increase the organic matter instantly.

Exactly what worms do..........

the funny thing or SAD thing was.... they had special chemicals to kill all the earth worms because a big old worm casting ball on the surface would stop or deflect a golf ball and that was a NO NO.