Take care of your yard and your whole house will become more valuable
September 28th, 2008 by DanYou can spend all kinds of money remodeling the inside of your home but no one except a few visitors and your family will get to see it. In taking care of your yard the whole world will get to see it. Your yard and landscaping can increase the value of your home by up to 10%. The largest part of your yard is your grass and you don’t have to pay a service company from $600 to $1200 a year to take care of it. If you give it a little personal attention, you can accomplish better results for a lot less money. By following these few tips you can reap the benefits a beautiful yard can provide.
Let Your Yard Grow Tall
Cut your grass 3 inches tall and at most mulch an inch and a quarter of the blade. By mulching your grass you keep all of the nutrients in your yard. But if you have to cut off more you will need to bag your grass and remove the clippings.
Fertilize More In The Fall
Fall is the time to develop deep roots in your yard. Choose a fertilizer with a large middle number on the bag of fertilizer. Fertilizers come with 3 numbers to quickly tell you what is in the bag (30-4-4). The middle number develops roots. We are looking for a number in the teens or higher. We also recommend to do 2 fall applications and skip the the summer treatment of your four step fertilizer plan.
Seeding Fall, Late Winter, Spring
Fill in your bare spots and over seed the whole yard, to give it a rich lush turf. Fall is by far the best time to seed. The next best time to seed your yard is to throw your seed down before the last snow of the winter season. Spring is also a good time to seed, but as you get closer to summer you will need to baby your new seedlings through the summer months. Don’t forget to use starter fertilizer when you put your seed down. Remember you can not apply seed if you have used any weed killer and most crabgrass preventers within 6 weeks.
Water or Not to Water That is The Question
We have all been told that your lawn needs 1″ of water per week. If you are going to water your yard when we need rain, you need to commit to watering through the hole season. Or choose to let your yard go dormant. If you choose this route don’t do any part time water. It stresses your turf to bring it in and out of dormancy. If you are going to water, water in the morning because it will evaporate less and dry before nighttime when diseases can start. Water long enough to moisten the soil to a depth of 1 and a half inches.
Crabgrass prevention
You will need to apply a crabgrass preventive in early March and if you missed that opportunity you can put down a liquid crabgrass killer but it is always better to prevent than to have to deal with killing it.
Kill The Weeds
You can take care of any weeds in your yard by spot treating with a liquid killer or by spraying the whole yard to cover items you might have missed. Read the label on your bottle for a temperature limit. Most limit day time temperatures to 85 degress or less. You can also kill your weeds in your yard with a weed-n-feed fertilizer. Follow directions on the bag for instructions. Remember most weed killers need two days without rain for a complete kill.
These few steps can add value to your home and be the envy of your block.
Posted in Lawn & Garden