Fall Lawn Care

Create Glowing Green Grass with These 5 Fall Lawn Care Tips

Fall lawn

The fall can be one of the busiest times of year. In the midst of all the hustle and bustle of school starting, PTA meetings, and soccer games, it might feel like it is a good time to sit back and relax when it comes to your lawn care.

However, the fall happens to be one of the best times of year to do some much needed lawn maintenance. If you have ever wondered how your neighbors have made their yard looks so beautiful, it is most likely because they went the extra mile to follow these 5 fall lawn care tips.

When you find an afternoon free of tasks and responsibilities, get outside, and give your fall lawn some love. Come spring when your grass comes back up thick, green, and beautiful, you will be so thankful. All the hard work you put into your fall lawn will stand out.

Here are 5 Fall Lawn Care Tips to do Right Now:

  1. Aerate The Soil
    Aerating your soil might be something you do often to your lawn or it might be a lawn care tip that is new to you. For those that are new to this helpful tip, you are about to embark on an incredible way to make your grass gorgeous.

    Aerating is the process of getting oxygen to plant roots. When you aerate your grass you are allowing oxygen, water, and fertilizer to easily reach the grass roots. This greatly impacts healthy growth.

    There are two different ways that you can get this task accomplished on your grass. You can rent a gas-powered, walk-behind lawn aerator from your local hardware store. You might be looking at paying $70 – $100 for a day aerator rental. For those individuals that have a large yard, you can always hire a landscaping contractor to do the aerating for you. This can be especially helpful when you are sitting three to four acres of land.

    The fall is the absolute best time of year to aerate your grass as it is best to do accomplish this task when the weather is cool. This is especially true for grass types like fescue, bluegrass, or rye. According to the DIY Network, you will want to do this during the months of “August through October when the grass is breaking its dormancy and begins the period of growth.”

  2. Keep Mowing
    When the fall hits, you will want to keep watering and mowing your grass. As the temperatures begin to drop more and the season comes to a close, you can drop the mower’s blade to the lowest setting.

    Popular Mechanics suggests that this is down for the last two mows of the years. They also suggest to not cut the grass more than one-third of the grass blades at any given time. You can lower the cutting height gradually throughout the season instead of all at one time. The reason for this is to give the sun a chance to reach the crown of the grass.

  3. Rake The Leaves
    With the fall comes those incredibly beautiful crimson, gold, and violet colored leaves. Each one of those leaves will be falling in the next few weeks. You might be wondering, since this is a lawn care post, how do those leaves impact your grass?

    Racking leaves might not be your favorite fall activity, but it is super helpful when it comes to the healthy growth of your grass. When the leaves are left on your lawn, the leaves can get wet with rain or morning dew. This not only makes them much heavier to rack, it also can cause the leaves to stick together and form a mat that will suffocate the grass and can even grow fungal diseases.

    There are two ways to remove your leaves from your yard. The first way is the old fashion way and rack them in large piles. If you have a larger landscape this might not be the best option for you. You can use a lawnmower with a fitted collection bag or a vacuum system. Both ways will do the trick. Rack or collect the leaves as they fall. Try not to wait.

  4. Fill in Spots
    During the fall months are a great time to fill in bald spots in your lawn. It is best to do this at least a month before the first possible snow or frost will come. You can buy an all-in-one lawn repair mixture. These mixtures are made with ready-to-use grass seed, but also continues the lawn fertilizer and organic mulch that will help your grass thrive. After you have placed your mixture down in the bald spots on your fall lawn, make sure to water. You will want to water every other day for two weeks to help the growth.
  5. Fertilize
    Fertilizing your fall lawn is a great lawn care tip to accomplished, especially in the fall. According to Popular Mechanics, most lawn care expects will agree that the best time to fertilize your grass, if you do it only once a year, is in the fall. While it might seem like a strange time of year because the grass’s growth is slowing down. The roots, however, continue to grow quickly. When you apply fertilizer to your grass, you are equipping your lawn with the essential nutrients that your needs to grow deep healthy roots.

    There are a number of ways to apply the fertilizer to your lawn. However, we believe that the best option is to use a walk-behind drop spreader. This might take a tad longer than other methods, but it does the best job at spreading the fertilizer evenly.

Bringing it Home

When it comes to taking care of your lawn, taking some time to give your grass some much needed love will go a long way. These five fall lawn care tips are sure to help your yard look amazing come the spring. Your grass will have had the essential nutrients and care to ensure a healthy root system which will create glowing green grass.

 

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