Lawns and Grass: Every House Needs a Lawn
Every house wants an area of grass that can be turned into an attractive lawn. The grass can be patchy, scattered with weeds taller than some plants, sun-scorched in a few small areas due to lack of shade and, therefore, different green colors, but none of that matters.
Create Your Own Lawn
The thing about it is, that you have a lawn that can be worked on and turned into something that looks amazing, but if you don’t have a patchy lawn, to begin with, you don’t have the necessary foundation to start a lush lawn.
Your own work or an Artificial Lawn?
The next question, I suppose, is whether or not you want to develop this lawn naturally by yourself or whether you’re going to get turf strips and an artificial lawn. Once you’ve made that decision, you can start work on getting yourself a luxurious lawn.
A Natural Lawn (Our Choice!)
If you choose a natural lawn, you need to look at some of the challenges:
- Patchy and weed-infested
- Check your climate –warm-season grasses (can handle less sunlight and tolerant of traffic), cool-season grasses (don’t tolerate a lot of traffic and need extra watering).
- Aeration is done by a spike roller to air the roots and get better drainage.
- Scarifying is used to cut or tear into the soil and remove the dead grassroots.
- Weeds are mostly broad shaped and easy to kill and remove.
- Do a regular pest control regime and change your insecticide regularly.
- Lawn diseases – apply fertilizers to your lawn.
- Top Dressing is applied to an uneven surface to help a lawn recover from a cold season.
- Sometimes your lawn won’t respond to top Dressing; then you must do the leveling yourself with a shovel.
- Fertilize your lawn every three months, which will keep it looking healthy
What About Temperature?
When you’ve given serious thought to the above topics of Lawns and Grass if you are still leaning towards creating your own lawn then before you seed, let me ask you a question, have you taken temperature into consideration?
Where are You?
There are some great grasses out there – but where? Where are you, and what’s best in your area?
Yes, again, areas are of enormous importance, and getting the right grass for the right area is all the difference to getting all those glances of envy and the smiles of admiration. You can be a seasoned pro, but if you don’t know your areas (and many don’t), whatever you know doesn’t help nearly as much as you know your areas.
Are You South or North?
Are you South or North? (Are you in that strip following the lower elevations of Virginia and North Carolina west, through West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Arkansas; the one that also includes southern Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri and Kansas”).
If that’s the case, you can select something nice from these options:
- North: Kentucky Bluegrass. Cool-season grasses do best in more moderate temperatures, and this grass is ideal.
Kentucky Bluegrass - North: Perennial Ryegrass.
- North: Fine Fescue.
- North/Transition: Tall Fescue.
- Transition: Zoysia Grass.
- Transition: Bermuda Grass.
- South: Centipede Grass.
Laying Down Seed?
Yes, again, when are you planning on laying down seeds? You already know that it depends where you live! If you’re in the North, you’ll wait for warm climates – April to June.
Forget Seed – Use Sod
In the South, people should forget seeds altogether as sod works best in this region.
Do you remember those beautiful squares of earth and grass? That’s sod – May to June is best.
Fastest Growing Seed and Sod
Just back to seed for a minute. If your lawn needs a refresh, then North needs Perennial Ryegrass, and South needs Bermuda Grass in sod form. Now, these two are the fastest growing in your area, so you’ll be getting a new look or makeover in no time at all.
A Healthy Lawn
Did you ever sit and think about the fact that most lawns are a combination of different grasses? Just plant a combination of seed, and your lawn will thicken out.
Nourish The Lawn
Put a layer of coconut fiber on top – because it holds the moisture in its place for longer and makes sure your lawn gets nourishment.
Thicken the Lawn
If your lawn is looking a little thin and sparse, use fertilizer – turf builder – and particular weed killers, which are all designed to thicken and toughen up your lawn.
Have an Artificial Lawn
If none of the above appeals to you and you find yourself preferring the idea of
faux grass, then we start looking at all things artificial and see if that suits our preferences in a better way, and then we can make the decision of real weeds and patches or artificially lush green grass lawn.
A Difficult Choice
It’s quite a difficult choice to make because quite apart from the fact that it would be nice to have your own real lawn that you’d done all the ‘heavy lifting’ for, and therefore you could say honestly it was all your own work and hard labor.
Get Other People to Install an Artificial Lawn
It would also be nice to have an artificial lawn that a company installs – other hands, not yours, doing the work, while you sit back and tell them what you want and how it should look, etc. These installers design, install and supply your Artificial Lawn.
Get Gradient Exactly Right
However, the drawback is that it can be costly and, if you don’t get the gradient precisely right, to allow the water to run off, the turf could start to perish as the water stagnates in the regular grass beneath.
Hydration is a Must
Invest in a good Sprinkler System as new lawns should be watered weekly, to begin with, and there’s no way you are going to look forward to doing that by hand! These systems are designed so you can select different settings according to your lawn’s different needs.
All About You
Whatever you choose, always remember that this is your home, so it’s always going to be all about you and what you want.
You get what you want, and you appreciate it more, so you look after it more. Nature cannot be taken for granted – it always has needs regularly and isn’t slow to show them – so you’ll always know where you’re needed, and for what!
