So just what are the top lawn care tips I’d like to share with as many people as possible? Just the basics that we all should know and be aware of as lawn owners. No big fancy tricks of the pros or anything like that, just the basics we all should be aware of and practice as lawn owners who want to keep our lawns in as reasonable condition as possible throughout the year and over the years.
These are those lawn care tips, the article is a little long, but has to be to properly articulate for good understanding. Nothing difficult here, just awareness, and perhaps a few little changes to how we might manage our own lawns.
These are not the top lawn care tips to have the best lawn in the street, for that is an ambition which may be well above most of us, and most of us have lives which are already filled to overflowing with responsibilities already, and having the best lawn in the street just isn’t a priority for almost all of us, including the author. In the real world most of us would like to have our lawns in the best condition they can be in, with the least amount of lawn problems, and with the least amount of expended time, money or energy spent in the process.
And such is the task of this article, the basic lawn care practices which we should all be aware of and practice in order that we too can keep our lawns in their best condition, without them becoming a rabbit hole of obsession. So these are the top lawn care tips for the rest of us most of us.
Choose The Best Lawn Type For Your Home
A major reason why many of us can face problems with our lawns is because we have the wrong lawn types growing in our yards. Every environment where each of us want to grow a lawn is different from every other, so there is no one size fits all solution to choosing a lawn variety for our homes, and there most certainly is not any single brand of lawn which is perfect for all situations.
Shade levels and sun levels are most important considerations for us, and each type of grass has different preferences and requirements for each. Some of us want a pristine bowling green lawn, while others of us don’t want to put much effort or time into our lawns. We may have poor soils of either sand or clay, or we may live by the ocean. Our lawn may require heavy usage from children or pets playing or from being subject to vehicle parking, while other people may only need a lawn for light usage.
There are a lot of under-utilised lawn varieties available in this country, both seed and sod, and we as Australians have become extremely narrowly focussed in recent years as to which grasses we may even consider to grow. There is a wide array of choices available to us, and we all should broaden our thinking quite a lot to take full advantage of these options, so that we can choose a lawn which is most particularly suitable for our own home and our needs.
Buffalo grass is the most over-used lawn type in Australia today, and it’s also the most often diseased lawn type I regularly encounter, it’s a great grass for its most suitable environments, being partial shade, but it’s just way over-used by a country mile. Couch also has been a great all rounder for Australia, but there are more options still past these. Male Sterile Kikuyu grasses have been given a gigantic leap forward in every aspect of quality in recent decades, and they are no longer a spreading problem due to their seed being made sterile. Modern Zoysia grasses such as Empress or Zenith or Compadre are excellent choices for full sun and light to medium shade. Saltene or Seashore Paspalum is an absolutely terrific fine leaf and extremely tough lawn for many people living by the ocean, or who may have poor soils or poor water quality. Queensland Blue is being improved all the time and has been an old favourite in Australia for a very long time, though it has been slightly forgotten in recent years due to all the grass company advertising for other grass types. It’s time to forget all those ads, and look instead to the wonderful different options which are available to us and which have been for such a long time, so that we can choose the very best type of lawn for our own home. The best lawn begins with choosing our lawn variety wisely.
though I might choose a Couch lawn in full sun - depending on the property and location
Implement A Year Round Lawn Fertilising Program
Another hugely forgotten and neglected aspect of our lawn care is the lack of attention to feeding our lawns well. Our lawns will get much of their required nutrients from our soils, but there is hardly such a thing as a well balanced soil anywhere which will give our lawns everything they need to maintain their full health throughout the year.
Also as we grow our lawns not as wild grasses from whence they came, but as lawns that we want to be green and cut low throughout the year, then we must supplement their diet with added nutrients to achieve that aim. Think about any wild grasses which may be suitable to derive a lawn from, and look for one that stays green all year round… there really isn’t one. These wild grasses grow through different seasons in their lifecycles, sometimes green, sometimes brown, sometimes seeding and so forth. We however want our lawns not to go through these natural cycles but to remain green always. And to achieve this we must feed them with that which they need ( as well as to artificially water them in the hotter months - to keep them green ).
A good lawn fertilising program, to adjust throughout the year, is a wise course of action for us all. The more pedantic lawn owner can take things to however high a level they so choose, and the rest of us who are less so inclined can put into place a lesser lawn fertilising program. Whether we feed greatly or little, a dose of good quality fertiliser at different times of years will do wonders for our overall lawn health. It doesn’t need to cost a bundle, and even a little every now and then is better than nothing at all.
Increase Sunlight To Lawns / Or Increase Shade
All lawn types will require direct sunlight every day to remain in good health, and in some cases, even to stay alive. For those of us who have lawns which are doing poorly in our yards, and if those lawns are sitting in slightly heavy shade, then we really should do something about it, lest the shade on our lawns worsen, and before we may possibly kill off our lawn in any particular area where shade has and continues to encroach.
For such heavily shaded areas we can prune back bushes and trees to increase direct sunlight to our lawn, or we may want to consider permanently moving any other fixed type of objects which may be causing shade from that area if we can. Any extra sunlight in shade affected lawn areas will greatly improve lawn health.
If we do prune back and increase sunlight and the lawn is still not much better by the following Summer, then we may be able to increase lawn mowing heights in the affected shady area, or we may wish to consider planting a more shade tolerant lawn variety instead. Couch, Queensland Blue, and Kikuyu are all full sun grasses and will not cope with much shade at all. Zoysia will take some extra shade, and Buffalo is the most shade tolerant of all the more popular lawn grasses.
Buffalo can and will grow in full sun conditions, though this is a grass which does much prefer and will most excel when a little bit of shade is present. Buffalo growing in full sun is prone to heavy thatching, and Buffalo grown in partial shade can be cut with a longer leaf length, making for a far more attractive lawn. In such cases as Buffalo growing in full sun, a small tree planted in the centre of a small lawn can do wonders for our overall lawn appearance.
Mow Lawns Regularly Dependent Upon Season
Mowing lawns regularly in direct correlation to the season and the growth rates of the lawn is essential to maintain good lawn health. Regular lawn mowing keeps the lawn looking green as any thatching is likewise regularly removed in the mowing process, and the cutting action will prompt the lawn to grow more green leaf to repair itself after mowing, in a process called tillering, whereby the lawn produces more leaf and fewer stolons and rhizomes (runners).
Winter lawn mowing is also important to maintain, as this keeps thatch under control in the colder months. Winter can often be deceptive to the eye when we look at our lawns, when the grass may not be growing so much green leaf, but will continue to grow its stolons, albeit at a much reduced rate. For those of us with healthy lawns we can find that Spring may be a surprise if we haven’t mowed our lawns all Winter, and then when we do we can discover our lawn coming up brown after mowing, requiring more time to repair, whereas others of us who fertilised our lawns just before Winter and then also mid-Winter, and maintained lawn mowing over Winter, will often sit back with joy as our lawns spring back to life, lush and green in Spring.
Mulch Mow Lawns
Mulch mowing our lawns is one of the very best things we can all do to improve the quality of our lawns and our lawn soils. Instead of catching and then disposing of our lawn clippings, we put a mulch plug into the back of the lawn mower chute, which then forces all clippings through the mower blades many more times, often pushing the finely chopped clippings back into the lawn sward, and also dispersing them on the lawn’s surface.
These finely chopped clippings quickly break down into the lawn soil to feed our lawns with Nitrogen, feed our soils with an ongoing supply of organic matter, and help to insulate our soils and our lawn roots over the hot Summer months from drying out and then damaging our lawns.
Lawn clippings are a wonderful nutritional supplement that should never be thrown away, they are absolutely free, and mulch mowing saves us time mowing our lawns with not having all those stops to empty the catcher.
We should all be mulch mowing our lawns.
Begin A Better Lawn Watering Program
We all have habits developed over the years which we tend to stick to for very long periods of time, one of which is how we go about watering our lawns. We may have our set routines or even a water reticulation system in place to water our lawns on set days for set times, which is even more convenient for those of us lucky enough to have these systems.
But the fact remains, there is a right way and many not so good ways to water our lawns.
We should all let our lawns tell us when they need their next watering. The lawn will show signs of water loss and that it’s time to turn on the sprinklers again. This will usually be when the leaf of the lawn begins to wilt and may look a little off colour. When it’s time to once again water our lawns, we then water much more deeply than we normally would… and we water in the mornings.
Watering in the mornings helps to prevent lawn diseases from outbreaking on our lawns, and gives the lawn the water it needs when it needs it the most, during the entire period of the day, when the sun is out and active photosynthesis is occurring in the lawn. This also helps to conserve some water that might otherwise just drain away into the water table should we have watered at night when the lawn is less capable of utilising that water immediately.
Watering less often and more deeply trains our lawns over the years to send down its roots far deeper into the soil profile. This makes lawns far more drought tolerant, and much less susceptible to heat damage during the hottest Summer days. It should also use less water over the course of the year, even though we are applying more water, because we are watering less often.
Control Thatch As Required
Most lawns will thatch up from time to time, and this can become most noticeable when we continue to mow our lawns at the regular height that we always do, but now our lawns come out brown in patches, or all across. If using a cylinder lawn mower on a fine leaf lawn we may instead see that our lawns have “tram lines” across them where the cylinder mower had been cutting.
This build up of thatch can most often occur on lawns that are quite healthy and well looked after, though it can also naturally occur more often on certain grass types, and can build up over time for even a moderately well managed lawn. Buffalo grass growing in full sun is quite susceptible to heavier thatching, whereby there will be less thatch when that same grass is grown in partial light shade.
When we realise that thatch has built up in our lawns it’s time to plan to remove it. The best time to remove lawn thatch is in the Spring before the weather heats up. We can do this by lowering lawn mowing heights over a few cuts, and then increasing mowing heights back to the regular height once the thatch has been removed. Many fine leaf and healthy lawns may require vertimowing to thoroughly remove heavy thatch build up. Buffalo growing in full sun, and if any particular lawn has been noticed to be regularly increasing in thatch, can be cut back every Spring as part of our normal lawn care regimen.
Treat Lawn Problems Swiftly
Big lawn problems are best treated before they’re actually big. Yeah, I know, common sense, right. We can all get busy in our lives and our lawns are not the biggest priority for any of us, far from it. However, before our lawns get overcome by weeds, and before those Army Worms devour the entire lawn, we may want to give some consideration to treating any problems that do appear, with haste.
It’s better to spend 10 minutes to pull out some weeds by hand this weekend, than repeatedly spraying for Oxalis weeds in 2 years time, at great cost, and with having to use the required herbicides.
Better to put down some fertiliser or wetting agents now, rather than allowing our lawns to thin out, and then to be overcome with weeds, or to develop bare patches.
Better to mow our lawns this weekend, rather than have the lawn turn brown when we mow in a month’s time.
We all get the gist, lawn problems, like any other type of problems, only worsen over time, and all require far more effort and time to overcome a big problem in the future - over a problem which barely exists today. A little effort is all it takes on a semi-regular basis, and a little awareness of how our lawn is doing from week to week.
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