Tri-County News

Spring lawn care


Because of the early spring, many want to get a jump start on lawn care. Be sure to assess your lawn before getting ahead of yourself. Turf plants are very sensitive in early spring, and it is important to know when to do what for the healthiest lawn. Many may discover that the optimal time for several lawn care tasks is not actually spring, but rather late summer.

First step in doing spring lawn care should be assessing your location. Regardless of good practice calendars, each spring is different and each yard?Äôs conditions can be different. Before doing any lawn care be sure the frost is out and the ground has firmed up. Due to the dry conditions we?Äôve had this winter and spring, some lawns have already firmed up, but you want to ensure that the soil is no longer cold and muddy before doing work.

Some might still have leaves to clean up; be aware that raking too early may cause damage. Raking might uproot the grass plants or simply walking on your lawn may cause compaction to the soils. In nearly all yards there are likely different conditions in different areas. Monitor all parts of your lawn, and selectively work in areas that are ready before doing mass work across your whole yard.

Some may notice narrow, twisting ridges of loose grass or uprooted grass. Likely meadow voles have tunneled these small trenches. The best method to remediate meadow vole damage is to rake up the loose grass and any clumps of uprooted plant material. Most of the damage caused by the meadow voles is actually confined to the grass foliage rather than the crown of the plant, which is the part of the plant responsible for regrowing new shoots and grass blades. However, if there is extensive damage, re-leveling these spots and possibly adding topsoil and overseeding may be necessary.

That brings up the question, when I should fertilize, seed, apply pre-emergent crabgrass herbicide and dethatch? Recently the University of Minnesota Extension released a new lawn-care calendar. Note the solid line indicates the best time to perform the activity, and the dash line indicates an acceptable time.

Breaking old habits might be hard to do, but to improve the health of your turf, and maybe save you both time and money, follow the lawn care activity chart. Keep a copy of this for your reference, or visit www.extension.umn.edu/garden/landscaping/maint/calendar.htm.

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