Guide to Life: How to take care of your lawn
In tending his lawn in the Clintonville neighborhood, Ben McCorkle takes a simple approach: “the bare minimum.”
“I mow once in a while,” said McCorkle, 41. “I don’t water.”
In a week, he said, he might spend an hour, tops, on his lawn.
Grandview Heights resident Brian Peach, on the other hand, gives his lawn much more attention.
He mows a couple of times a week, waters occasionally and fertilizes three times a year.
And, should he spot a stray dandelion, he treats it immediately.
“I go in and get my little spray bottle and remember where the weed is,” said Peach, 63.
Regardless of where you fall on the lawn-care spectrum — from following a strict fertilization schedule to cutting the grass whenever you get around to it — certain guidelines can help you maintain a healthy lawn.
We consulted lawn experts for advice about the basics.
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Weeds are in the eye of the beholder.
Pam Sherratt, a turf-grass specialist at Ohio State University, doesn’t mind a little clover.
“I think we could all live with a few dandelions and violets and clover,” she said.
Homeowners with less tolerance for weeds, though, can banish them.
For starters, said David Shetlar, an OSU professor of urban landscape entomology, build up a thick, dense lawn that doesn’t leave room.
“Most of the dandelions and .?.?. weeds won’t germinate unless the sun actually is hitting the ground,” Shetlar said.
With help from Sherratt and Shetlar, we offer a guide to treating some of the weeds that most plague central Ohio:
Crabgrass
How to treat it: Apply a pre-emergent herbicide in the spring. The product will prevent seeds from germinating.
“Put that out at the same time that the forsythia is starting to bloom,” Sherratt said. “You want to have it out before the end of March.”
Dandelions, clover, violets, ground ivy, plantains and speedwell
How to treat them: Apply a broadleaf-weed control in the late fall. The best time, Shetlar said, is late September or early October, before the lawn goes dormant.
“What you’re targeting are the young weeds,” he said, “actually before you even see them.”
Prostrate knotweed
How to treat it: “It’s actually the first weed in Ohio,” Sherratt said. “It typically comes up mid-March. So, if you’re going to put some sort of pre-emergent weedkiller down, you’d have to put it out mid-February.”
Prostrate knotweed, Sherratt said, is an “indicator” weed.
“Prostrate knotweed means you’ve got really compacted soil, hard soil,” she said. “If you’ve got it, it’s because grass can’t grow there. So you’ve got to fix the problem.”
Warm-season grasses such as Bermuda grass and zoysia
How to treat them: To kill them, you have to kill everything else in your lawn.
“You would have to use what we call a nonselective weedkiller like Roundup that kills everything,” Sherratt said. “You’d have to kill it, see what came back, kill it again, see what came back and probably kill it again.”
Or you can just deal with it.
“I inherited a Bermuda-grass lawn in Clintonville,” Sherratt said, “and I just live with it."
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What to do and when
Lawn care can be as simple or as complicated as you want it to be. The important thing, experts say, is to develop a thick, healthy lawn. Fertilizing (with synthetic options or natural ones, such as manure) can help. But when do you fertilize? Reseed? Aerate? People tend to think about lawns in the spring — when the grass is green and you start to see weeds crop up. A bit of effort in the fall, though, will work wonders come spring. Here’s a calendar to guide you:
SEPTEMBER
• Seeding: Spread grass seed between Aug. 15 and Sept. 15.
• Fertilizing: Apply your fertilizer of choice at advised rates.
• Dethatching: Thatch is a layer of decaying plant matter that forms between the green part of the grass and the top of the soil.
Too much thatch can keep water and fertilizer from making their way to the soil.
If thatch is more than a half-inch thick, use a dethatching machine to remove it.
• Core aerating: Aerating — removing little cylinders of earth from the ground — helps break up tough soil and can help prevent too much thatch from building up.
If you don’t have an aerator at home, you can rent one from a home-improvement store. Or invite a well-heeled crowd over for a party on the lawn.
OCTOBER
• Broadleaf-weed control: If you have a problem with dandelions (or wild violet or other so-called broadleaf weeds), late fall is an ideal time to treat them.
NOVEMBER
• Fertilizing: If you’re going to fertilize only once a year, do it in the late fall — before the ground fully freezes.
DECEMBER through FEBRUARY
Stay warm inside and try to enjoy the lawn-care-free season in central Ohio.
MARCH
• Mowing: Grasses typically start growing in mid-March or the end of March. So, once your grass is growing, start mowing.
The ideal height? About 3?inches.
If you let the grass go too long without mowing, don’t chop off more than a third of the length at once, or you could stress the grass. Cutting too short also could allow weed seeds to get sun and sprout.
• Crabgrass control: If you plan to apply a pre-emergent crabgrass treatment, March or April is a good time — once temperatures hit the 60s during the daytime.
APRIL
• Seeding: If you are in need of thicker grass or have bare areas, spread seed once the soil is workable.
• Fertilizing: If you didn’t fertilize in late fall, you can do so now.
• Mowing: Cut grass as needed, keeping it about 3 inches tall.
MAY
• Mowing: Cut grass as needed.
JUNE
• Watering: Grass typically needs an inch of water each week.
If it gets that in rainfall, great. If not, water as needed.
Different types of grass call for different amounts of water.
Tall fescue typically doesn’t need much watering.
Kentucky bluegrass, however, is another story: It needs plenty of water.
• Mowing: Cut grass as needed.
JULY
• Watering: Water as needed. If you don’t water very often and it doesn’t rain enough, the grass can go dormant (and brown) but remain alive. If grass is dormant, water a half-inch to an inch every two weeks to keep it healthy.
• Mowing: Cut grass as needed.
AUGUST
• Watering: Water as needed.
• Mowing: Cut grass as needed.