Boxhill Farm Organics

9 Steps To A Lush Lawn

1. Sharpen up.
Dull lawn mower blades tear at grass, giving it a frayed look and making it more susceptible to disease. Sharpen the blade now to assure a neat, clean cut. The local hardware store or lawn mower dealer can sharpen your blades quickly—for about $5 a blade.

2. Cut it high and often.
Leave the grass no shorter than 2.5 to 3 inches tall. Short grass doesn't compete well with weeds, has less surface area for taking in sunlight, and has weak roots. And tall grass looks thicker. Just be sure you never cut off more than a third of the grass blades at any one time, even if you have to cut weekly, or more.

3. Drop those clippings.
Leave the grass clippings where they fall. They provide half of your lawn's nitrogen needs. And they add organic matter to your soil, which keeps important beneficial microbes in the soil active and well-nourished.

4. Don't overfeed.
Many people fertilize their lawn too much, too often. That makes the grass susceptible to disease. And it makes the lawn grow faster, so you have to mow more often. Most lawn grasses require 3 to 4 pounds of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet annually. Grass clippings left on the lawn return about 2 pounds of nitrogen to the soil. Spread a quarter-inch layer of compost on the lawn and you add another pound. (Simply fan the compost onto the yard with a shovel and rake it out evenly.) For many lawns, that's enough fertilizing for the year.

5. Feed right when you do.
If you don’t have/can't get enough compost, apply organic fertilizers made of plant residues and by-products of animal processing—blood meal or feather meal. Look for a product with an NPK (nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium) ratio of approximately 3-1-2. Apply no more than 1 pound of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet during each application. Be aware that organic fertilizers are release their nutrients slowly, so you get gradual, but sustained "green up" for your lawn. Chemical fertilizers green up the grass quicker, but leave the grass hungry for more quickly, too.

6. Drop that hose.
Resist the urge to sprinkle each evening. Frequent watering promotes shallow roots. Instead, give the lawn one good soaking per week and take rainfall into consideration.

7. Crowd out or pull weeds.
Researchers at the University of Maryland have found that mowing cool-season turf grasses to 3 inches high works as well as or better than herbicides for suppressing crabgrass. Dandelions, the bane of cool-season lawns, send down a taproot as deep as 1 foot. To kill an established dandelion, you have to remove at least 4 to 5 inches of the root. You can use a sharp trowel or knife to do the job, or buy one of those nifty weed-extraction tools. And remember, by simply keeping your grass at least 2.5 inches high, you will shade many dandelion and other weed seeds so they won't sprout.

8. Knock out weed sprouts.
Corn-gluten meal is a by-product of food processing that's used to feed livestock. It's also a proven killer of weed seeds and seedlings. Spread it on your lawn in spring, and it reduces any newly sprouted weeds. It will also kill new grass seed, so use it only on an established lawn. And because gluten contains 10 percent nitrogen, be sure to factor it in if you decide to fertilize. You can think of it as organic "weed 'n feed."