Important Fall Lawn Maintenance Projects

You’re almost ready to pack your bags for winter. But before you get too excited about another great lawn season, here are some things you can do to make a difference in spring. These 15-minute lawn maintenance tasks will make it easy to relax when the temperatures drop.

Lawn Maintenance Tips

Take care of your lawn

Two fall feedings can make the difference between a beautiful lawn and one that is just okay. Your lawn will start rebuilding the roots that were damaged by the dry, hot summer. This is why it is important to fertilize in fall. You can also kill several kinds of lawn weeds in fall, such as clover and dandelions. Apply weed- and feed products.

It kills weeds, nourishes the lawn and also prevents fire ants. Fire ants, as their name suggests, are not a good idea.

You should continue your fall fertilization 6-8 weeks later.

Get your Lawn looking great

It can be damaged when kids play on lawns that are still suffering from summer heat and drought. Use a product that is specifically designed to repair bare spots on your lawn, such as the one left by the kiddie pool.

Keep the soil surface moist during any seeding project. It is best to water the soil once per day, or as often as necessary until the seedlings reach a height that allows for easy mowing.

Mulch your Leaves

Tree leaves shouldn’t smother your lawn. Fallen tree leaves won’t insulate your lawn in winter, contrary to popular belief. They can actually be a nuisance by blocking sunlight and thinning grass. To help soil microbes breakdown the leaves, you can ditch the rake. Instead, mulch your leaves with your lawnmower to a dime-sized size.

Clean the gutters

While you hang holiday lights, pretend you don’t fear heights. When winter storms arrive, you don’t want your gutters clogged. You should hire an expert to help you clean the gutter as part of your lawn maintenance routine.

Mow your lawn

Late fall is the best time to start mowing your lawn shorter than usual. Keep mowing your lawn shorter and shorter until the grass stops growing in winter. Go a little lower for the final mowing.

All of your lawn furniture can be stored

It is probably too cold to drink lemonade outside, so put away the cushions and move the furniture and grill into storage until next year.

Clean out your tools

These tools have served you very well throughout the season. But now, you are done with your fall lawn care. It’s time for you to get rid of the tools. It will prevent them from rusting by cleaning them before hanging them up. Don’t forget to maintain your winter mower after you have finished mowing the year.

It’s hard to beat personal attention from a lawn care expert for any questions you have about your garden or lawn.

Call Conway Lawn Care Service now if you need help in maintaining your lawn.

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Conway Lawn Care Service
Conway, SC 29526
843-353-2259
http://conwaylawncareservices.com/

Lawn Care Guide on Maximizing Your Small Yard

Do you own a small yard similar to the size of a postage stamp? One of the best lawn care tips in making the most of a tiny room inside your home or outdoors is being creative with your style and also positioning. Also, do not hesitate to live your desires even if you need to customize them a little bit.

Experts in lawn care in Conway SC say that among the greatest blunders with a little yard is to dive right into it without preparation, leading to a messy appearance, plants, and furniture. The outcome could be littered, confined, and disorderly.

Guide to Getting The Most Out of Your Yard

• So begin your preparation

According to lawn care experts, if necessary, you can get inspiration from an old landscape design, although it may be a terrifying idea: you desire tidy, clear ground to begin with. Removing old plants likewise gives an opportunity to work great deals of plant food right into the soil. It can also set weed barriers so your yard will be healthier as well as less complicated to keep. Distribute the measurements of your lawn and also produce an in-depth illustration with repaired functions like your residence, deck, as well as restrictions.

• Use a fence

You can also set up a decorative fence, particularly along the roadside, as this will certainly produce a specified area and include some personal privacy. Keep your boundary clear and simple, with plants in similar shades and heights.

An excessive variation could make your fence feel disorderly. Establish paths to vital components of your home and also the backyard, then see to it the products are suitable to the setup, whether you are working with a concrete specialist to mount a fundamental concrete pathway for a mid-century contemporary home.

• Choose Specific locations for special functions

Develop locations where you desire a lot more remarkable functions, like a fish pond, an accent tree or bush, or a statue. In a tiny backyard, you do not have a great deal of room for these design components, yet you do have some, so make the most of it. At the same time, make sure everything ties right into the bigger yard style and to the house. When you have a tiny lawn, it is more difficult to carry out locations with significantly various style aesthetic appeals, due to the fact that they could really feel disconcerting.

• Use fewer furniture

Downplay the tiny size with little, basic outdoor furniture that will certainly feel huge thanks to the surrounding room, natural light and airy plants. Usage tipped balconies, paths, and wood decking to keep focus along the upright axis of the backyard. It will certainly make it appear larger and set up mirrors in brilliant places to contribute to the dimension.

You do not wish to make visitors believe that your lawn is poor, however, you could transform it right into an area that really feels a lot larger inside. There are great deal of imaginative ways to utilize a tiny lawn. With this, you may simply yourself loving your small area. Nevertheless, unlike your buddies with big-sized yards, your lawn design will certainly be a hit!

Call Conway Lawn Care Service for a landscape that exceeds your expectations.

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Conway Lawn Care Service
Conway, SC 29526
843-353-2259
http://conwaylawncareservices.com/

How To Carry Out Weed Control On Lawns

Weeds are unwanted plants that steal the nutrition and minerals of the important plants and crops that are growing in your garden. And they may grow on the nutrition and food off your important plants and may hamper their growth. That’s why weed control is essential.

It is very important to protect your plants and garden from weeds through proper lawn care methods.

Weed Control Tips

Weeds grow at a much higher speed than the normal plants growing in your garden. Weed control is good lawn care in Conway method in which weeds are prevented to reach a mature stage when they can harm pets and plants.  In order to reduce the number of weeds, there are different weed control strategies that can be applied to prevent its growth.

The most common and preferred method that is applied in order to remove and destroy weeds is plowing.  Today there are many other chemicals present in the market that can help you decrease the number of weeds growing in your garden.  Herbicides are widely used in different parts of the world to control the growth of weeds.

In domestic gardens, there are different methods like covering the area of the garden with many layers of newspaper for several weeks in order to control the number of weeds.  Also, you can use a black sheet instead of a newspaper.

You keep a newspaper for seven days, it prevents the light of the sun from entering beneath and hence kills the unwanted plants.  Saturating the newspaper that you place on the ground every day helps in the decomposition of the plants that die in this process.

The dead plants also help in increasing the nutrition and minerals of the soil.  After a few weeks, you will find most of the weeds are dead and can be removed easily.  If you are using a black sheet then the greenhouse effect will help you in killing the plants and weeds beneath it.

The weeds reproduce at a much faster rate than other plants and you will be able to see that they survive most of the adverse conditions as well.  It is very important to know the kind of weeds growing in your garden so that you can easily kill them using the correct lawn maintenance method and herbicides.

One of the common techniques that are used by growers in different parts of the world is the Stale seed bed in which soil is cultivated and left for about a week.  When the seeds are germinated in the ground, there are increased chances for the growth of weeds that hampers the growth of the plants and eat up their nutrition. Stale seed bed helps in killing the weeds at the time of germination and helps in retaining the essential nutrients of the soil.

Need help with caring for your lawn? Conway Lawn Care Services can assist with mowing, weeding and hedging. Call us today to schedule your service.

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Conway Lawn Care Service
Conway, SC 29526
843-353-2259
http://conwaylawncareservices.com/

Lawn Care Mistakes To Avoid

You water, weed, fertilize, mow, edge, and you can’t seem to grow the lush, healthy lawn you want. What’s the problem? These are common lawn care mistakes that you could be making.

1. Water your lawn daily or every other day

Regular watering encourages roots to stay near the surface of soil where they are more vulnerable to injury from pets and people walking on them. Your lawn is also more susceptible to drought stress in hot or dry conditions.

It can get worse. It gets worse. This prevents your turf from thriving and can lead to diseases. Frequent irrigation can also encourage harmful insects. These insects attract moles which tunnel through the soil and literally undermine all your hard work.

Deep and frequent irrigation is the best option for most residential lawns. Bermuda and zoysia, warm-season turf grasses, have the highest drought tolerance. Centipedes and St. Augustine are more sensitive to drought. Tall fescue, a cool-season grass that is most common in South Carolina, requires irrigation to maintain its beauty during the summer months.

One inch of water per week is a good recommendation for all warm-season grasses. Apply the entire inch to clay soils. Apply half an inch twice a week to lighter soils. The application should penetrate the root zone to 8-10 inches. After that, let the grass dry completely before you water again.

Collect many straight-edge containers with similar sizes to get an accurate measurement of your sprinkler’s output. Cat food or tuna fish cans work well; plastic food storage containers are fine if they’re not bowl-shaped. The containers should be placed in different areas of the irrigation zone. Turn on the sprinkler system, and let it run for 15 minutes. Measure the water level in each container with a ruler. This will tell you how long the system should run to reach the recommended irrigation level. This test should be done in every zone if you have an automatic sprinkler system.

Supplemental irrigation might be required in hot or dry conditions. If the lawn has a bluish hue or the blades are folded up, it’s time for you to water again. In the evening, walk across your lawn. If your grass remains flat in your footprints, water it the next morning.

2. Watering your lawn in early evening or the afternoon

Your grass and you will be disservice if you water your lawn in the evening or early morning. Watering your lawn before sunrise is the best practice.

Evaporation can cause as much as 20% to 30% of irrigation water to evaporate if it is applied in the afternoon. Even under the best conditions, about 2 percent of the water makes it to the roots. This fuels photosynthesis, which creates lush green growth. The remaining 98 percent is lost to the atmosphere through transpiration.

Plants are most vulnerable between 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. These are the best times to expose plants to sunlight and temperature. You should wait until the afternoon before you water the grass. The grass will not be able to produce its own food for most of the day.

The downside to routinely watering in the evening is that it doesn’t allow enough time for the blades to dry off before the dew falls, and creates a humid microclimate around them. This encourages diseases such as grey leaf spots, curvularia fungus and rust.

Pre-dawn watering is the best practice. The leaves can dry all day if irrigation is done between 2 and 9 a.m. Lawns and other plants in the area can photosynthesise throughout the day.

3. The lawn can be slopped

Routine mowing can be an important part of effective lawn care in Conway SC. But if your turfgrass looks like a drill instructor’s crew, it’s too much.

Your mower depth should not exceed one-third of the grass blade. Cutting the grass deeper can cause the grass to use more energy for developing healthy roots. This promotes stem growth. The grass’s density is affected by this increase in water and nitrogen consumption. Regularly trimming the lawn can cause it to enter dormancy earlier, and your lawn may suffer from more heat stress and cold damage.

Clippings can be quickly broken down and fed to the soil if you mow at the right height and frequency. Clippings don’t contribute to thatch, contrary to popular belief. Clippings contain 30 percent nitrogen and can be incorporated into the soil to reduce fertilizer needs.

Each turfgrass has a preferred height for mowing. To help thicken the lawn, keep the grass cut at a lower point in the season. To help the grass cope with the heat, increase the mowing height as the weather warms up. Keep the mowing height at the highest recommended level as the grass goes dormant in fall to help warm-season grasses such as St. Augustine and centipede withstand winter temperatures.

4. Mowing with a dull knife

When mowing, it is essential to use a sharpened edge. A dull blade can cause ragged cuts, which will give your grass a whitish appearance and stunt growth. At least once per year, sharpen or replace your mower blades.

5. Incorrectly applying fertilizer

Each type of turfgrass has its own nutritional requirements. Centipede grass requires very little nitrogen compared to other grasses. Centipede grass requires only 1 pound per 1,000 feet of area per year. Bermuda has higher fertilizer requirements and needs 3 to 4 pounds per 1,000 square feet. Calculate your square footage by multiplying the property’s width by its length, then subtracting the square footage of your house, flower beds, and driveway.

It’s a good idea to test your soil for a better understanding of your landscape’s fertilizer requirements. Check out “Digging up answers using soil samples”

It is equally important to choose the right fertilizer. You should not fertilize warm-season grasses until they are fully greened up in spring. It is best to wait until May to fertilize warm-season grasses, but not to fertilize them after August 1. The opposite is true for cool-season grasses. You should fertilize them in September and again in March.

You should look for fertilizer with one-third of the nitrogen in slow-release form. This will provide a steady, slow feeding of nutrients for six weeks. Never use more fertilizer than is recommended. Use this handy rule to measure the fertilizer before it goes in the spreader: Two cups equals approximately one pound.

Apply fertilizer to the dry grass blades, then water it. Split the recommended fertilizer amount in half to ensure even application. The first half of the fertilizer should be applied in one direction. Next, rotate 90 degrees to apply the second half. You can adjust the setting of your spreader to make sure you’re comfortable. Continue applying fertilizer in alternating ways until the recommended amount is applied to your lawn.

Call Conway Lawn Care Service now if you need the help of professionals in taking care of your lawn.

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Conway Lawn Care Service
Conway, SC 29526
843-353-2259
http://conwaylawncareservices.com/

Fall Lawn Care Tips

You can get your hands dirty and start fall lawn care once the heat has subsided. The right care plan for you will depend on the type of turf grass your lawn has. You can ask your local county extension for the type of lawn you have by giving them a sample.

Lawn Care Tips For The Fall Season

Correcting pH

Have your soil tested if your lawn isn’t performing well. Make sure to correct any problems in the fall so that your lawn is lusher in spring. Apply sulfur if alkalinity must be decreased.

Controlling Weeds

In the fall, both warm- and cool-season grasses are still plagued by weeds. Make sure to apply a weed control product. Use targeted spot treatments to kill weeds that are more difficult than those in cool-season grasses.

The Yard Needs to Be Dethatched

Cool-season grasses can be dethached by raking, or using a piece known as a power mower or dethatcher. Thatch is a layer of organic material that can build up to more than half an inches thick. This can prevent water and nutrients from moving. Core aeration is a technique that can be used to correct soil compaction. This opens up the soil to allow air, water and nutrients in.

Warm-season grasses shouldn’t be cut or aerated in fall. This task should be saved for spring and early summer when there is activity growing.

Watering the Grasses

You shouldn’t assume that the fall temperatures aren’t as high as they used to be that you don’t need to water in the autumn. Cool-season grasses need to be cared for in fall. This includes making sure that they have enough water during the winter. You won’t need as much water in fall as you do in summer. However, it is important to ensure that your lawns are hydrated during dry, hot spells in autumn.

The warm-season grasses need only be watered as long as it is growing. The grass can be reliant on rainwater for watering if it stops growing. If you oversee winter color, it is important to keep your lawn hydrated.

Fertilizing the Lawn

Also, cool-season grasses need to be fertilized. You can apply 1 pound of nitrogen to 1,000 feet of lawn3 or buy a product with a low, middle NPK, such as Scotts’ WinterGuard Turf Builder, which has an NPK number of 32-0-10.

Warm-season turf grasses should not be fertilized in autumn. It undergoes a hardening process during this time to prepare for winter. This hardening-off process may be impeded by fertilizing warm-season grasses in autumn.

Overseeding the Grass

Homeowners whose lawns are made of warm-season grasses will be able to enjoy a green carpet in winter by overseeding them with annual winter ryegrass. Make sure you ask for the annual seed when buying the seed. The annual winter ryegrass will turn to warm-season grasses when the summer heat returns. This is a quick exit. Problem with perennial winter ryegrass? It doesn’t disappear, competing with warm season grasses for sunlight and water.

Overseeding can also be beneficial for cool-season grasses. In this instance, however, overseeding lawns does not serve winter cosmetics. Instead, it is a way to repair bare patches and to improve next year’s lawn

Mowing the Lawn

Warm-season turf grasses require a half inch increase in lawn mower height. You don’t need to adjust the height of cool-season grasses.

Mowing your lawn at the right height will save you from having your grass clippings raked or bagged. When your grass is 3 to 3 1/2 inches high, and dry, mowing should be done. Do not trim your grass below 2 1/2 inches. Never get rid of more than 1/3 of the leaf surface in one mowing. The grass clippings are valuable nutrients that can be used to improve your lawn’s health. However, they should be left where they are after mowing.

This lawn maintenance tip will require more frequent mowing but will result in a healthier lawn that is fed with nutrients that you wouldn’t otherwise have to haul away. Mulching lawn mowers will make this easier. The clippings are finer so you don’t have to be as careful when cutting your grass.

Cleaning Leaves

Leaf management is beneficial for both warm- and cold-season grasses. However, mats of leaves can cause lawn damage. If you have more leaves than that, you can rake, bag or compost them.

Call Conway Lawn Care Service now if you need an expert in lawn maintenance.

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Conway Lawn Care Service
Conway, SC 29526
843-353-2259
http://conwaylawncareservices.com/