Lawn repair “overhaul”
There are times when you have to renovate and restore the entire lawn. For example, planted the wrong grass, which you wanted, or made a mistake with the choice of seeds. Or the lawn was badly damaged during the winter and mostly frozen. The grass grows unevenly: somewhere there are blips, somewhere there are gaps, somewhere there are weeds. Or maybe the lawn is many, many years old and no one has taken care of it? The solution is universal – such a lawn needs to be repaired.
Preparing your lawn for renovation
- Once the snow has melted and the floor is warm and dry, carefully inspect your entire lawn.
- Pick up large debris, pick up leaf debris with a rake, remove rocks, branches.
- Clear the lawn area of foreign objects on it.
It is not unreasonable to replant plants, especially if they grow on the lawn or along its borders. After all, it is better for a while as little as possible to walk on the lawn, and even less “pulling” branches. Or maybe there are old plants on the plot where you want to sow the lawn.
- Allow the grass to grow before the first mowing, inspect possible repair locations, estimate the area, and calculate future material costs.
Stages of lawn repair
If your lawn is in poor condition, there are several steps to lawn repair.
Treating for weeds
- Treat the lawn for weeds with selective herbicides (if weeds have had time to grow on the lawn).
- These may include products such as Hacker, Lintor, or Lontrel.
- You may have to get rid of all the vegetation on your lawn with general action herbicides (such as Roundup).
Rescue
- Moving the lawn to a height of 2-3 cm.
- In this case, such a small mowing will not hurt, but is a guarantee of high quality and further repair.
Scarifying
Do not confuse the process of scarifying the lawn with combing. They are essentially different things.
- Choose powerful gasoline-powered ones with floating tails. Such a scarifier, going out on the lawn, will do 4 necessary and important procedures at once.
- It will even cut furrows in the turf and stimulate it for better division and growth.
- It will work like a mini grader, that is, it will alloy the surface of the lawn.
- And also not only on the surface, but also in the deeper layers, littering.
- And, of course, will serve to better ventilate the lawn.
- The resulting even furrows facilitate the access of air, moisture and nutrients from fertilizers to the roots of the grass. And also promotes the germination of seeds.
Do not neglect this procedure in the repair of the lawn, and because it is almost the most important. Everything else will be just “cosmetics”. Do not forget that we are “treating” the lawn.
Picking up garbage
- Pick up all the debris and old felt lifted with a rake.
- And if you have treated the area with roundup, it is very easy to collect the “broken” after scrubbing, the remaining grass.
Sedimentation
- This process involves accumulating seed of the desired grassland type in the desired amount (more bare patches are seeded thicker).
- Calculate the amount of seed based on half of the full seeding rate (40-50 g per m.), Provided there is grass left over from the previous seeding in the lawn.
- Use the full seed rate when sowing if you are removing unwanted vegetation completely.
Filling and priming
- To restore the lawn should be evenly covered and leveled with a mixture of peat and sand (in the ratio of 2/3 of peat and 1/3 of sand) in a layer without 1-2 cm.
- Some craftsmen mix peat, sand and seeds at once and already such a mixture is distributed throughout the lawn. 1 m cu. Up to 1 kg of seeds should be added to the mixture of peat and sand.
- If the soil is heavily depleted or on the lawn a lot of irregularities and holes, then before sowing the seeds, the lawn should be covered with a mixture of peat and sand, and a layer of bedding will be at least 3-4 cm – evenly throughout the area and in hollows and irregularities for the needs. Then the seeds are planted and covered with a rake.
In general, you need to look carefully at your lawn and determine what needs to be done first – to bring it into the proper form or add soil. There is one nuance: if it is not very convenient to cover the seeds from above, in some places they remain on the surface.
- Instead of peat, you can use specialized nutritious lawn soil, which is sold in garden centers, or order an imported plant soil for lawns, enriched and enriched with fertilizers. In this case, there will be no surprises in the form of a sea of mature weeds or some rutabaga, buy high-quality, “clean”, disinfected soil.
Final steps of the repair
- Roll the entire plot with a hoe weighing at least 50 kg.
- Fertilizer appropriate for the season. Fertilizer can also be made immediately after trash collection as written.
Additional lawn care
- Regular daily watering before the grass sprouts and regular watering 2-3 times a week, depending on the weather, after the grass has emerged.
- The first mowing of the mature grass is done at the height of 8-10 cm.
- Then regular watering, mowing and fertilizing.
Carrying out such a serious lawn repair, pay attention to the composition and structure of the soil. Repairing the lawn avoids such time-consuming work as digging up and taking care of the whole site. However, if the soil beneath your lawn has become completely unusable, you need to think again about building your lawn from scratch.
How do I care for my lawn after winter?
Winter in our country in most regions is very long, and, of course, everyone is looking forward to the sun and spring. However, warm days bring unpleasant surprises. Snow melts, exposing all the damage on our carefully tended lawn. Yellowed grass, patches of dead turf are definitely not a picture that pleases the eye.
To keep your lawn looking beautiful in the summer, you need to work hard in the spring to restore it to its former beauty. How do I care for my lawn after the winter? When to start mowing? How to feed the grass? These and other questions that bother lawn owners, we will answer in this article.
How do I care for my lawn after winter? How do I restore my lawn in the spring?
Most likely, if the winter was overcast and snowy, the lawn suffered a lot. It lacked light, but had plenty of moisture. If this is the case, snow mould is likely to have developed. It is caused by a fungus that visually appears as a white stain on the lawn.
During the winter, the lawn is in a mild and warm overwintering condition. Such conditions favor the appearance of moss, which actively grows and replaces the grass.
A hard frost provokes the water under the lawn to freeze. As a result, the top layer is literally aging from the roots, which leads to the withering of entire sections of the lawn.
And in late fall and early spring, moles become active. And we unfortunately see ugly films of soil all over the lawn.
As a result, there is always enough operation on the lawn in the spring. This is necessary to restore its ornamental qualities and increase its resistance to pathogens and pests.
When do I start lawn restoration work in the spring?
You need to wait until the snow has melted, the ground is firm and dry. Early work on wet ground leads to a disturbance in the smoothness of the surface. Foot “dents” form.
How to care for your lawn after the winter: Checklist
Lawn Fear.
Stroking is the removal of dead grass, removing organic debris. In early spring, dry and yellowed grass is very visible on the lawn. These residues interfere with the germination of young grasses and interfere with their nutrition. Old grass is removed with a fan or special devices – scarifiers.
After treatment, of course, it is inevitable to remove healthy bushes and damage some of the roots. If there is no “feel” of the old lawn, the healthy grass will quickly recover. And the lawn will quickly regain its aesthetic appearance.
Treat only areas of the lawn that are at least 2 years old. Such treatments can damage young lawns that have not yet put down roots.
And it’s best to give up the scare when you need to roll a lawn that’s been ripped out of the ground. In this case, scarifying can excessively damage the lawn.
Lawn Compensation.
After scarification, you often find that the surface of the lawn is uneven and wavy. This is only due to water that has separated from the floor when the top layer froze. The lawn should therefore be rolled with a garden path. It is best to do this on a slightly damp floor.
Grass is strong and resilient and will rise again after rolling. So you do not have to worry about this procedure.
In addition, it is desirable to cover the lawn with a small layer of sand. It fills small holes in the lawn, which perfectly level the surface.
However, it is worth remembering not to roll the lawn on sound, heavy and compacted soils. In this case, rolling with even more compression of the floor suffers. You should therefore only roll your lawn if the condition of your lawn really requires it and the soil is not reinforced. Annual rolling of the lawn is only sensible on lightweight floors.
Lawn ventilation
Then you should use ventilation with shoe spike tips or a special ventilation tool. Punching the lawn helps loosen the floor and improve the oxygen supply to the roots of the lawn grass.
Lawn piercing.
New seeds should be sown in areas that look lifeless. Burned out areas simply need to be tilled. And then add nutrition, sprinkle a thin layer of fresh fertile soil. Then sow fresh grass and water.
Lawn fertilization
Without the use of fertilizer, effective lawn restoration is impossible. You should only fertilise when the temperature in your lawn has been consistently above 5 degrees for many years.
Lawn grass especially needs nitrogen in early spring. In addition, phosphorus and potassium can be helpful. It’s convenient to use ready-made lawn fertilizers, preferably with a long-lasting effect. This ensures that the lawn is fed evenly and for a long time. And the grass quickly becomes thick and lush. After fertilizing, it’s important to water the lawn.
Watering the lawn in spring
Lawns do not need watering in early spring. After the winter, there is enough hearth left in the deep soil layers. And thereafter, depending on the weather, the lawn will be watered with the necessary regularity. The lawn should always be moderately wet. That is, not flooded with water and not over-dry.
Lawn mowing
The first mowing of the grass usually takes place in mid/late April when the height of the lawn is around 8 cm. The first 1-2 mowings should be short, after which you can leave the height at around 5 cm. Regular cutting will flatten the grass and make it more dense. Do not cut more than 40% of the grass height in one cut. Irregular mowing inevitably leads to higher cuts that damage the lawn and kill some of the grass.
Wait until mid-April or early May to make the first cut of the season, depending on weather conditions and the growth rate of young shoots. Do the following regularly, i.e., every 7-10 days, for the rest of the season. Pay attention to the working height of the mower’s cutting blades. For best results, cut 1/3 of the height of the lawn, about 5 cm. Lower ones can damage the young shoots and disrupt their proper growth, resulting in weeds.
You can easily mow your lawn with an electric or gasoline lawnmower. However, you will need a trimmer to remove the grass along the borders.
Weed control
Weeds are the bane of any lawn. Dandelion, clover, lapweed and other weeds simply smother the lawn and crowd out the “cultivated” grass.
In such a situation, selective herbicide treatment is recommended. Herbicide should act on weeds without damaging the culture (our grass). In our country, the drug Lontrel is very popular.
Of course, even after herbicide neglected lawn can not be completely free of weeds. In this case you will have to resort to manual weeding.
