Steps For Maintaining Your Grass

Proper Lawn Maintenance Tips

When it comes to outdoor landscape, a beautiful lawn is one of the most eye-catching aspects of your home. Without proper grass maintenance, your lawn can start to develop dead patches or become infested with weeds and parasites. Taking care of your lawn increases the curb appeal of your home. It also provides a beautiful green space to enjoy. Beyond watering and mowing your grass, you need to ensure you are feeding and treating it with proper fertilizer. Additionally, the steps required immediately after installation are crucial to a successful project.

Outdoor Makeover & Living Spaces have years of experience with sod installation and lawn maintenance. By following the steps below, you can ensure that your lawn will be beautiful and long lasting.

General Grass Maintenance

Mowing

Regularly mowing your lawn is one way to help ensure it stays healthy and growing strong. Mowing your lawn to the proper height helps support the natural root system and is crucial to its health. This allows the roots to better support the shoots of grass. The longer your grass blades are, the more ground shade they provide. This is important, as it slows evaporation and creates an environment for weeds to grow. Mowing more than 1/3rd of the grass blades can damage your grass. In terms of timing, it is best to mow your lawn when it is cool outside. By mowing your yard when it is cool, usually during morning or evening, allows your grass to recover from the cut. Mowing during evening is ideal, as the grass has all night to recover and ready itself for a full day of sun. Also, varying your mowing pattern can help your grass grow evenly and prevent any undesired patterns of growth.

Always ensure your lawn mowers blades are sharp enough. Outdoor Makeover & Living Spaces recommend sharpening your lawn mower blades two to three times per year.

Aerating and Dethatching

Aerating and dethatching your lawn prevents compact soil. Compact soil is a result of traffic such as mowing or walking and can block oxygen absorption. Oxygen absorption is very important to the health of your lawn, as it supports a healthy root system and encourages growth. Aerating and dethatching your lawn allows it to break down organic materials faster. This also allows better absorption of oxygen and provides a better environment for your lawn to grow.

Fighting Disease

Like any other living organism, your lawn is susceptible to disease, infections, and parasites such as fungi. A few common lawn diseases are brown patch, red thread, snow mold, rust disease, and summer patches. It is important to properly identify and treat these conditions to prevent long term damage.

Preventing Lawn Disease

Following proper grass maintenance steps is the best way to prevent lawn disease. Mowing frequently and keeping soil pH at the proper levels are crucial. Proper soil pH level is slightly acidic, around 6.0 to 7.0 pH. Ensuring you fertilize the lawn helps promote healthy and hearty grass. When thatch, or the material that collects around the base of the grass, builds up beyond ½ inch in thickness, it can restrict water and air. This creates an ideal environment for lawn disease. Dethatching and aerating your lawn regularly allows your lawn to fight off any potential diseases.

When these steps are not enough, pesticides can be used to treat severe infestations. Using the proper pesticides can fight off fungal diseases as well. We recommend using a lawn chemical maintenance company to ensure proper pesticide treatment.

Zoysia Grass Maintenance

After Installation:

· Water 25-30 minutes per day (excluding days with rain/or on days where the temp is below 28 degrees Fahrenheit) for first 21 days.

· If temperature is below 60 degrees Fahrenheit, reduce to 15-20 minutes of watering.

· If temperature is over 85 degrees Fahrenheit, increase to 40 minutes of watering.

· Water 2 to 3 hours before grass exposure to sunlight.

· Do not water at night.

· Do not add any fertilizers or weed killers for the first 45 days after installation.

· As a preventative measure, you can optionally put out a broad-spectrum pesticide.

· We recommend using a chemical maintenance company to maintain the feed and weeding of your lawn.

Recurring Maintenance:

· When grass grow to a height of 2 inches or more, mow it down to 1.5 inches

· Water 1 inch per week as necessary in early morning, especially during the warm season.

· Do not water at night.

· Apply weed and feed in early spring.

· Every year or every other year, dethatch your lawn.

Bermuda/Centipede Grass Maintenance

After Installation:

· Water 25-30 minutes per day (excluding days with rain/or on days where the temperature is below 28 degrees Fahrenheit) for first 21 days.

· If temp is below 60 degrees Fahrenheit, reduce to 15-20 minutes of watering.

· If temp is over 85 degrees Fahrenheit, increase to 40 minutes of watering.

· Water 2 to 3 hours before grass is exposed to sunlight.

· Do not water at night

· Do not add any fertilizers or weed killers for the first 45 days after installation.

· As a preventative measure, you can optionally put out a broad-spectrum pesticide.

· We recommend using a chemical maintenance company to maintain the feed and weeding of your lawn.

Recurring Maintenance:

· Keep Bermuda/Centipede grass mowed to a height of 1 to 1 ¼ inches.

· Water 1 ½ inch per week (as necessary).

· Use a pre-emergent herbicide or pesticide in February. This will help create a barrier to prevent weed seeds from germinating.

· Aerate grass in March.

· Use standard weed and feed throughout the growing season (45-60 days). Only fertilize Centipede grass once per seasonbut continue standard weed treatment.

· Use winterizer in the Fall (ideally October, but may be as late as December). Winterizer is a fertilizer that is applied in the late fall that is designed to help your lawn store food for the winter months. Properly winterizing your lawn can encourage rapid growth when spring comes. Ideal winterizing treatments are mostly nitrogen fertilizers

· Regularly remove leaves off sod.

· We recommend using a chemical maintenance company to maintain the feed and weeding of your lawn.

By following these lawn maintenance steps and landscape maintenance tips, your yard will be the talk of the neighborhood! If you are ready to overhaul your lawn or get started with a new landscape design project, contact us at Outdoor Makeover & Living Spaces. Our team of landscape experts have been providing the best landscape and design services in the Atlanta, GA area since 2001.