2015 Lawn thread

[Craikeybaby]

jagnet said:

Good grief, she's properly cropped that

Fortunately, by maintaining a higher cutting height previously your grass will have a good strong root system with plenty of carbohydrates available in reserve to utilise until it can start photosynthesising again.

What you don't want to do at this stage is apply any fertiliser high in nitrogen as that will deplete the roots even more. Leave it to recover of its own accord, which it will do relatively quickly, and in a couple of weeks apply a low N autumn fertiliser so that the grass plants can strengthen their roots and rebuild their carbohydrate reserves.

As for the suggestion that a low cutting height will prevent the yellowing underneath... not really. There will always be some on a healthy domestic non ornamental lawn with a nice thick sward. Yes, the lower the normal height of cut the shorter that will be, but scalping the lawn will still reveal it. But then it's not normally visible, nor a problem, because nobody would be careless enough to scalp the lawn and remove all the green growth that enables the grass to photosynthesise, would they?

Edit: it's also worth noting that sacrificing mothers-in-law to the lawn gods will also speed up recovery. Burning at the stake is preferable as the potassium, phosphorous and magnesium in the ash are all good for developing strong roots and strengthening the turf against stress. Just be aware of it raising the pH too much. Avoid blood letting as blood meal is normally added for its nitrogen content.

Edited by jagnet on Thursday 8th October 00:08

Thanks, I'll look at some low N fertiliser and leave the grass for a few weeks.

[RichB]

Willeh85 said:

jagnet said:

Edit: it's also worth noting that sacrificing mothers-in-law to the lawn gods will also speed up recovery.

Is it bad that the first time I read that, I read it as Scarifying?

Ditto.

[MrChips]

Moved into our new house about a week ago, and having come from a south and west facing dual garden we knew we wanted some decent sunlight to hit the lawn.

Now after a week I think I'm realising how little gets through the 2 trees (one is ours, other is not and I think has a TPO)





For a house that has been empty almost a year, the grass looks in good nick so I'm gonna wait till next year then decide what to do about the tree(s).

Just need to buy a new lawnmower now as I left my trusty Briggs engined one at our old place.

[jagnet]

Congrats on the new house. The grass seems to be coping ok under the tree, no doubt in part to it being left somewhat longer more frequently with the house being empty.

It does look very shaded in the corner, but there's some very shade tolerant seed blends containing Poa supina that will also stand up to a shorter cut and the rigours of heavy traffic if it's to be a family lawn. P. supina doesn't stand up to drought so well.

If wear and tear is going to be less of an issue then the more common fine fescue / browntop bent shady mixes should do fine if given a reasonably sensible cutting height in the shadiest parts.

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

And, needless to say, it's important that you go over it with the mower regularly to suck up all those leaves.

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

Just given mine its first boustrophedonic mowing since the first sowing about six weeks ago. It's not looking too bad; still a bit sparse closer to the house where it's very shady, but there is still young grass developing from the subsequent sowings.




In the spring I plan to treat it with a pre-emergent to prevent crabgrass, but I might leave out the shady areas so that I can overseed them if they're still looking sparse. The crabgrass doesn't tend to affect the shady areas anyway.

Edited by Dr Mike Oxgreen on Saturday 10th October 13:07

[Craikeybaby]

jagnet said:

As for the suggestion that a low cutting height will prevent the yellowing underneath... not really. There will always be some on a healthy domestic non ornamental lawn with a nice thick sward. Yes, the lower the normal height of cut the shorter that will be, but scalping the lawn will still reveal it. But then it's not normally visible, nor a problem, because nobody would be careless enough to scalp the lawn and remove all the green growth that enables the grass to photosynthesise, would they?

Edit: it's also worth noting that sacrificing mothers-in-law to the lawn gods will also speed up recovery. Burning at the stake is preferable as the potassium, phosphorous and magnesium in the ash are all good for developing strong roots and strengthening the turf against stress. Just be aware of it raising the pH too much. Avoid blood letting as blood meal is normally added for its nitrogen content.

Edited by jagnet on Thursday 8th October 00:08

Had more criticism today that there wasn't enough light getting to the base of the lawn

Burning at the stake is sounding more tempting.

She also commented that the lawn was really thick, but it does look like it needs scarifying, I'll leave that until the spring though.

[hacksaw]

After scarifying first week of September and reseeding, last week I hollow tined and top dressed. Today I gave it a trim, very little to take off as I'm in process of lifting the cutting height. Also applied first application of autumn fertiliser. I'm really hoping that this years efforts shine through in spring next year!

[jagnet]

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

That's coming on really nicely

It never fails to surprise me how much impact the shade has on germination time.

Craikeybaby said:

Had more criticism today that there wasn't enough light getting to the base of the lawn

Burning at the stake is sounding more tempting.

She also commented that the lawn was really thick, but it does look like it needs scarifying, I'll leave that until the spring though.

[richierich37]

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

Edited by Dr Mike Oxgreen on Saturday 10th October 13:07

That's coming in well Dr!

[iambigred]

hI've been following this thread for a while since moving into my new house. At first glance our lawn seemed ok but it seemed incredibly soft, spongy and seemed to retain a lot of water. After a bit of investigation (and learning the difference between grass and moss) I discovered that there was a significant amount of moss across the entire lawn, particularly bad along the left-side, beneath the trees at the back and in the lower-lying parts of the lawn.

27/09: after a mow, probably cut too short. At the time I thought I'd done a great job, but looking back it's a bit of a mess. Some scalping due to the uneven lawn. The white patch in the bottom right is some over-spray from spraypainting some furniture, please ignore!). The garden was originally half the size, the piece of fence on the right follows the original boundary of the property and the entire lawn dips across at this point.


Since then I bought 25kg of reject Ferrous Sulphate reject from eBay that had been sitting around for a while so it had solidified into massive clumps, but this was ok as I diluted it in a large watering can using the pressure washer which removed the clumps easily. I tested this out along the left side of the garden and almost immediately the grass darkened and the moss started turning black. The next weekend I treated the remaining of the lawn.

I manually tried to scarify the test area with a rake (fail!), which was back breaking work. Not fancying raking the entire lawn I bought an electric scarifier yesterday for 30 quid from Gumtree - which works great!

11/10: post-scarification, sorry for the window reflection on the photo

I scarified vertically then across at an angle at the highest height setting. After each length of the garden the grass collector needed emptying. Even on the second pass it was still pulling out so much dead grass and moss, I filled my entire garden waste bin and then some. I spread some Westland After-Cut that I picked up cheap from Wilko's across the entire lawn and watered.

Now let's wait and see what the next few weeks brings. My dad has an aerator in the garage so might give that a try next week Any suggestions or feedback more than welcome!

Alex

Edited by iambigred on Sunday 11th October 20:22

Edited by iambigred on Sunday 11th October 20:23

[jagnet]

iambigred said:

Now let's wait and see what the next few weeks brings. My dad has an aerator in the garage so might give that a try next week Any suggestions or feedback more than welcome!

Aeration on a neglected lawn is definitely well worth doing.

That's a very good start on getting the lawn back into shape. Don't be disappointed to find that the moss returns (although to a lesser degree) over winter. The main thing is to work out why it was so prevalent - poor drainage, shade, weak turf, compaction, high soil pH can all contribute. If you can eliminate or lessen the causes then it becomes much easier to keep it at bay.

Cut the grass on a high setting over winter to give it the best chance of out competing the moss - 2"+ should be fine.

Consider scarifying again and overseeding in the spring. That'll also be a good time to deal with some of the high and low spots in the lawn to even it out a little.

Edit: it's also worth being aware that with your earlier ferrous sulphate application plus the Westland all in one that's potentially a lot of iron down on the lawn, so some of the grass could suffer and turn black as well as the moss.

Edited by jagnet on Sunday 11th October 22:50

[Cactussed]

Gents

got some iron sulfate from lawnsmith.
Appl rates all talk about grams per sqm.
Any ideas what that might equate to in a 5L sprayer for moss control?
I have a 5kg tub of the stuff.

How much do i dissolve in 5L of water?

[Philemon]

http://www.lawnsmith.co.uk/topic/how-to-feed-lawn/...

The application rate all depends on how quickly you walk, as well as the dilution ratio?

Edited by Philemon on Monday 12th October 10:39

[Patch1875]

GYou will be fine with around 300/400 grams per 5l you can pretty much put lots down when it diluted with water, spray up and down the lawn then do the same across to avoid the stripy look.

[Patch1875]

Also go round the perimeter first and make sure you keep it off any paving and wipe your feet in the beds before stepping off as you don't want to trail it anywhere.

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

Cactussed said:

Gents

got some iron sulfate from lawnsmith.
Appl rates all talk about grams per sqm.
Any ideas what that might equate to in a 5L sprayer for moss control?
I have a 5kg tub of the stuff.

How much do i dissolve in 5L of water?

Do a practice run with just plain water in the sprayer, and count how many times you have to refill the sprayer to cover the whole lawn. Work out the total amount of ferrous sulphate you want to apply to the whole lawn by multiplying the application rate (in grammes per square metre) by the size of your lawn (in square metres), and divide that by the number of sprayer refills. Dissolve that amount into each 5 litre sprayer fill, and walk at the same speed that you did on your practice run.

By the way, the only time I've used ferrous sulphate before, it didn't dissolve very well and left a suspension of insoluble precipitate that wouldn't dissolve no matter what I did. I wonder if the acidic ferrous sulphate was reacting with the alkalinity of my tapwater and forming a precipitate - would it dissolve better in rainwater perhaps?

[Patch1875]

It can take a while to disolve I mix mines the day before and use with no issues just remember to give the container a shake before putting in the sprayer.

[hacksaw]

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

.........would it dissolve better in rainwater perhaps?

Strange you mention rainwater, last night I was looking at upgrading my rainwater collection for next year and one of my questions on here was to be, would rainwater be better for irrigating lawns than tap? If so, I'm going to look to rig up some kind of pump powerful enough to run my sprinkler next year.

[Cactussed]

Thanks Gents, advice much appreciated as always.
Here's to a black and green lawn.