2016 Lawn thread

[Johnnytheboy]

I overseeded my lawn in early May.

Should I be ok to put Autumn feed/mosskill stuff on now?

[wjwren]

Do you have much moss? I only say that as I always seem to get scorching when applying an all in one product. I dont bother anymore as I dont get moss. Mainly by cutting the grass at longer lengths. When I first moved in there was more moss than grass.

[Craikeybaby]

Johnnytheboy said:

I overseeded my lawn in early May.

Should I be ok to put Autumn feed/mosskill stuff on now?

I also overseeeded in May and did my autumn/summer feed a few weeks back. Haven't needed to add any moss killer, as cutting the lawn on a higher setting has stopped the moss.

[MonTheF1sh]

Just did the autumn routine including scarifiying the lawn and over seeding, but thinking I was putting down some fertiliser on top of the seed I've just realised it was acutually evergreen 4 in 1 (weed and feed type stuff). When putting it away I noticed it said not to use on new lawns, have I just wasted all my grass seed (it was dropped on the lawn along with the seed on the same day).

[Rib]

quite possibly, I'd never generally recommend putting any kind of feed down when seeding, there's no point, just top dress and water

[Rich135]

I moved into my house in Feb so am just starting to try to get the lawn in order.

I bought an electric scarifier from Screwfix, which got up lots of thatch, then applied Scotts Miracle Lawn Grow Autumn feed the following day (the lawn was very brown other than one bright green patch where I had removed some awful concrete in the middle and re-seeded a couple of months ago).

Ideally I would like to put some new seed/topdressing down as well, but should I wait until Spring now, as I have just used the Autumn feed?

If I can put some down, any recommendations for seed and topdressing? I am a bit new to this! We want to use the lawn for croquet, so would like it to be nice to use, not just green. Lawn size is around 10m x 40m.

Many thanks

Rich

[Johnnytheboy]

wjwren said:

Do you have much moss? I only say that as I always seem to get scorching when applying an all in one product. I dont bother anymore as I dont get moss. Mainly by cutting the grass at longer lengths. When I first moved in there was more moss than grass.

Only a bit.

[jagnet]

MonTheF1sh said:

Just did the autumn routine including scarifiying the lawn and over seeding, but thinking I was putting down some fertiliser on top of the seed I've just realised it was acutually evergreen 4 in 1 (weed and feed type stuff). When putting it away I noticed it said not to use on new lawns, have I just wasted all my grass seed (it was dropped on the lawn along with the seed on the same day).

You may be ok, with any luck, since the new seed hasn't germinated yet. By the time it does, and with the additional watering to keep the seed moist, there'll have been some dissipation of the weed and feed. There's time enough before winter to see how that seed does before applying more.

Rich135 said:

Ideally I would like to put some new seed/topdressing down as well, but should I wait until Spring now, as I have just used the Autumn feed?

It'll be fine. Autumn feed is low in Nitrogen relative to P and K anyway, so you'll not be encouraging too much lushy top growth from the young seedlings.

Rich135 said:

If I can put some down, any recommendations for seed and topdressing? I am a bit new to this! We want to use the lawn for croquet, so would like it to be nice to use, not just green. Lawn size is around 10m x 40m.

You'll want a "fine lawn" seed mix. Fine fescues (such as chewings and slender creeping red) and browntop bent in a roughly 80/20 split are ideal and can be mown on a short cut. Assuming 20g/m2 overseeding rate, then a 10kg bag would do which also opens up some of the more professional mixes such as Johnsons J Green, Germinal's A1, DLF's Masterline PM10 - all of which would look very very good and perform well, containing top rated cultivars as they do.

Finer grasses do prefer a sandier acidic soil, so if yours isn't then they likely won't perform quite so well.

Top dressing shouldn't be too disimilar to the existing soil to avoid soil horizons forming over time.

[wjwren]

rotevated half the garden today, ground is poor where trees have been so put manure on it and have a builders bag of lawn mix topsoil coming friday i hope. Will reseed weekend.

[Rich135]

jagnet said:

You'll want a "fine lawn" seed mix. Fine fescues (such as chewings and slender creeping red) and browntop bent in a roughly 80/20 split are ideal and can be mown on a short cut. Assuming 20g/m2 overseeding rate, then a 10kg bag would do which also opens up some of the more professional mixes such as Johnsons J Green, Germinal's A1, DLF's Masterline PM10 - all of which would look very very good and perform well, containing top rated cultivars as they do.

Finer grasses do prefer a sandier acidic soil, so if yours isn't then they likely won't perform quite so well.

Top dressing shouldn't be too disimilar to the existing soil to avoid soil horizons forming over time.

Thanks very much, I appreciate the advice and will crack on!

[Nick_MSM]

Nick_MSM said:

Fast forward 5 and a bit weeks. Not that happy with the area nearest patio, very patchy. We're moving soon anyway but hopefully it'll thicken up the more it's cut The area which used to flood has so far stood up quite well in heavy downpours. Seems relaying the slabs there and added a lot of top spoil/leveling has helped a lot.

Update, fairly happy with how lawn has progressed. Had plenty of water of the summer and cut fairly high. Does seem thicker than this time last year, and the drainage bottom right has improved massively. Not moved yet so the lawn might be where I want it by the time we leave

[8-P]

Nick_MSM said:

Update, fairly happy with how lawn has progressed. Had plenty of water of the summer and cut fairly high. Does seem thicker than this time last year, and the drainage bottom right has improved massively. Not moved yet so the lawn might be where I want it by the time we leave

Looks good similar story here although I do seem to have quite a few weeds now, daisys and dandylions all but extinct just lots of other things. Time to do a full lawn weedkiller sweep I think

[panholio]

Hi All,

Thanks to this thread I seem to have made reasonable progress on my lawn this year. One of the key improvements was a full application of weedol I put on in June-ish. This seems to have really let the grass take over where it was once weed. I also applied some liquid lawn feed, but think it was too weak of a mix as it seemed to not have much effect. A new lawn mower and a good bit of aeration with a garden fork also seems to have improved things greatly.

I have a fair bit of moss in certain parts of my lawn so I purchased some Iron Sulphate which I am yet to use. I also have a few re-emerging weeds in places, and a large bag of seed mix. I also identified last week that I have three or four patches of "pink patch". Basically brown looking grass with pink fluff on....

What is my best course of action before winter? I was thinking of mixing up with water and applying some of this Iron Sulphate? I have a knapsack sprayer thing. Another blast of weedol to get the last weeds?

Cheers!

[Craikeybaby]

I wouldn't use the weedol again, I don't think you are meant to use the same type of weedkiller twice in the same year. Fortunately there are two types of lawn weedkiller, I use one for the whole lawn, and the other, bought as a meady mixed spray, as a spot treatment.

[Dejay1788]

Any ideas how I can get these patches of mud growing a little grass? I put down seed last year and it's improved it quite a bit, is it just a case of doing it again this year or am I missing something?

[AlmostUseful]

Started a new bit of lawn this weeek. Did all the leg work last weekend, now just watching it grow (and loving it!)

It's a very boring garden, but it looked like this (and that's after a stack of work anyway!)



And then it was levelled


Then it went from this


To this in about 20 hours!


So chuffed.
Last photo was taken this morning, Friday morning it was bare turf with some dead looking seed on!

[Alias218]

Bought my house about a year or so ago at which point the seller (a developer) laid down some turf. Fast forward 6 months and the new turf is now about a foot long (I didn't have a lawn mower. Why? I didn't have a shed - that's a whole different saga). Cut it down, and I'm left with a patchwork of earth and woody grass.

Have this past fortnight set about rectifying this (too hot during the summer months apparently) and have now spiked the whole garden, which is extremely arduous and strenuous in equal measure, have mixed up 100l of topsoil/grass seed and have liberally spread the mixture across the garden in the hope that the patches will become green. I gave it all good shave prior to this so that I won't have to mow anything for a good long while and give the new sprouts a chance to establish themselves.

So far grass has sprouted and it looks like by the spring I may have a comprehensive coverage! Who knew growing grass could be so much fun?

[Evanivitch]

Been levelling part of the garden ahead of turf.

I've had a long standing battle against bind weed and this patch was particularly bad.

Any tips to make sure it doesn't affect the new turf?

[moles]

Bind weed is impossible to remove best way I've found is to let it grow up a bamboo cane to a foot or so them glyphosate it. Just means you have to mow around it for a few weeks. It doesn't like being cut short though and normally is quite well hidden in a lawn.

[DanSkoda]

Managed to cut half of the lawn really short, raked an unbelievable amount of moss and thatch out of it. Aerated it with a garden fork, fertilised it and using 2 cartons of grass seed on top of all that. The lawn looks very sorry for itself right now. Managed to fill a recycling bin with the waste from approx 40m2!

I usually cover the seed with a bit of compost, but the stuff I was going to use has got water logged, will the seed establish on its own account without a covering of compost?