Lawns have a way of developing a shaggy or less than attractive appearance. If you stop to think about it, lawns aren't exactly natural. They are patches of grass well-manicured to look nice. Most lawns will naturally grow out of control to become massive wild fields if you don't tend to them. They may even have changes in color ranging from dead brown to yellow to spring green to dark evergreen.
If you want a lawn that is consistent in color all through the warm seasons, you need to take steps to ensure that. You can even start with the following easy steps this fall to make your lawn look greener next spring. Lawn care approaches in fall equal a beautiful yard next year.
1. Mowing Lawn in Preparation for Other Lawn Care Services
If you have ever looked at your yard in late fall and thought that maybe you should just skip that last mowing before the first snow, think again. All of that unmowed grass will do three things:
Choke off the new grass next spring.
Encourage yard pests like voles to tunnel through the yard during the winter and spring months.
Make it impossible to provide other services that will produce a healthy and very green yard next spring.
If you are going to hire someone else to help you with lawn care, such as the Lawn Brothers in Suffolk County or Nassau County, NY, mow your grass until the very last above freezing day possible. It prevents voles, mice, and other pests from calling your yard home. It makes it possible for other yard and landscaping services to be done and it makes those services more effective.
2. Aerate Your Yard
Aerating all of the grassy areas of your yard provides the yard with multiple benefits. One, it gets much-needed oxygen down into the ground to help grassroots grow better. Better roots mean greener yards. Two, aerating helps get nutrients and fertilizer, as well as new seed, get deeper into the ground before winter. Three, aerating ensures that new seed will actually take root and start to grow a little bit now and spring up very green next spring.
3. Fertilize and Re-Seed in the Fall
If you re-seed in mid-fall, the new grass seed has time to take root and begin germinating in the soil. This is important to produce a very thick, healthy, and very green yard next year. If you also fertilize, then the new seed and old grass will grow well together and produce a very lush green carpet all over your yard when warmer weather returns.
4. Be Vigilant About Removing Weeds
Weeds choke the life out of grass and take over your yard. Even if you remove the weeds, later on, they have already killed the grass in the areas where the weeds have sprung up. Then you are left with patches all over the yard that are not green and may even be lacking grass. Remove the weeds as soon as you see them, or treat the entire yard with a weed control product that kills weeds but keeps the grass.
5. Plant Grass That's Ideal for Your Climate
A really big factor in how green your yard is is the type of grass you have planted. If you live where drought is currently an issue (not totally unlikely in Suffolk County or Nassau County!), plant drought-resistant grass that stays green no matter what. Likewise, if you find that your yard is overly wet (common to Long Island New York), plant grass that is not bothered by very wet conditions and resists disease and fungus. If you're not sure what kind of grass seed to plant, ask the Lawn Brothers' advice.
6. Don't Mow Wet Grass
This tip seems a little counterintuitive, considering the fact that wet grass would decompose and provide nutrients for the living grass below, right? Actually what happens is that by mowing wet grass you create the perfect storm for fungi and grass diseases to develop. The rotting clippings don't act as fertilizer; they actually suffocate and kill the living grass underneath.
Mow lawn that is dry and not too high. Then rake up the clippings. You can put clippings in a composter until the clippings are fully decomposed and then use them as fertilizer in your yard.
7. Rake Dead Debris Off the Yard
Leaves, grass clippings, and anything else that is organic and rotting can only benefit your yard IF it has already fully decomposed elsewhere. Leaving all of this organic material in the yard over the winter kills the grass. It's akin to dropping something in the yard that compresses the grass and cuts off the sunlight to the grass. It turns yellow and dies because there isn't enough sunlight to create chlorophyll, the chemical that makes green things green. Rake the dead organic debris away to keep the yard looking nice now and help it collect more sunlight in the spring.
8. If You Have a Dog, Limit It to Just One Small Area of the Yard
Dog urine is a very potent herbicide, to say the least. Anyone with a dog knows that their dog's urine will kill grass faster than any market herbicide available. If your dog is contributing to a yellowish or dead yard, select one area on which to tie him or her out to avoid the dead spots all over the yard. Then you can correct most of the dead areas by sprinkling nitrogen-rich fertilizer and grass seed on those patches to restore the green grass.
Likewise, cars, trucks, and/or machines that leak fluids will cause these balding patches in your yard. Keep all leaking machinery in the driveway, shed, or garage, and off the grass.
9. Include Areas of Non-Grass to Make Grass Look, Greener
It sounds funny, but it works. If you place something gray or brown next to grass that isn't as green as you would like the grass to be, suddenly the grass looks greener. That is because the gray or brown item next to the green makes the green appear to be greener, even though it really isn't. To accomplish this visual trick, consider adding masonry or brickwork to your yard.
Masonry and brickwork are often shades of gray, red, and brown, all of which cause green to appear greener. Create patio spaces in your yard, or use brickwork to carve out landscaped areas in your yard. Not only will your yard look more attractive and inviting, but the grass and other greenery will look greener.
Additionally, it means that you spend less time mowing the lawn because you have less grass to mow. When you live on Long Island New York where there is so much happening every weekend that you would rather do, this concept of less mowing is very appealing. Entertain more on patio spaces and mow less.
10. Eradicate Insect Pests That Can Damage Your Yard
Insect pests tend to kill grass when they move in and build nests. For example, hornets, wasps, and ants will build hives and colonies right in the ground. When they do that, they choke off and kill grass in mounds around the yard. Killing these pests makes it easier to grind up their homes and restore the grass to these areas. Make sure your pest control expert knows what to use to kill the pests but not the surrounding grass.
Want Help With Fall Preparation to Get Greener Grass Next Spring?
If you live in New York state, you might be looking for "lawn care services near me." The search for "lawn care services near me" will yield hundreds of results, but the result you really want is Lawn Brothers Landscaping and Masonry Services. They are a one-stop yard care and masonry company all in one. As both a masonry company and a yard service provider, you will get everything you need to create the most beautiful yard possible without lifting a finger.
Call the Brothers today for a consultation and an estimate on services to get your greenest landscape yet!