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Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteers of Buncombe County

Lawns

What to Know Before You Buy That Grass Seed for Your Lawn

September 7, 2019

Is your lawn in need of replacing or repairing? Here in Western North Carolina, we recommend using cool season grasses—and August 15 to September 15 is the best time to plant!

Grass Seed

Seeding after these dates increases the chance of failure caused by winter injury. If you don’t accomplish seeding cool-season grasses in the fall, your best alternative is mid-February to early March.

Recommended grass species:

Tall fescue, Kentucky bluegrass, perennial ryegrass, and fine fescues—such as creeping red, chewings, and hard fescue—are cool-season perennial grasses used for lawns in the mountains. These grasses perform best in spring and fall and have a tendency to show signs of stress in the summer. Recommended rates of seeding for these grasses for new lawns/reseeding are between 1.5 to 2 pounds of seed per thousand square feet for Kentucky bluegrass and perennial ryegrass and 6 pounds per thousand square feet for tall fescue.

 Understanding the label:

Grass Seed Label

Much like a label on pesticides you purchase, the label on a bag of grass seed provides invaluable information about:

  • The seed variety or varieties: In the example given, ‘Grand Slam GLR’ is the variety of perennial ryegrass, ‘Midnight’, ‘Everest’ and ‘Bewitched’ are the varieties of Kentucky bluegrass, and ‘Radar’ is the variety of chewings fescue.
  • Purity: Purity is the percent by weight of each seed component (variety or species) in a mixture and is a measure of “seed quantity.” In the example given, 24.06% is pure ‘Midnight’ Kentucky bluegrass, 19.93% is pure ‘Radar’ chewings fescue, 19.73% is pure ‘Grand Slam GLR’ perennial ryegrass, 19.71% is pure ‘Everest’ Kentucky bluegrass, and 15.63% is pure ‘Bewitched’ Kentucky bluegrass.
  • Germination percentage: Germination is expressed on the seed label as the percentage of pure seed that is capable of growth. Germination declines with age of the seed and therefore seed older than 9 months to 1 year may be less viable than fresh seed. The date when the seed was tested for germination is included on the analysis tag as an indication of freshness and to protect the buyer. Purchase only the freshest seed of the highest purity and germination.
  • Date: The date when the seed was officially tested. It is January (01) 2019, in this example.
  • Other crop seed:Crop seed content is the percent by weight of all seeds identified in the bag that are grown as an “agricultural crop.” These must be specified by name if they exceed 5% of the weight of the seed bag. Look for the lowest possible crop seed content. In this example it is 0.08%.
  • Weed seed: The percent by weight of all seeds in the container that have not been identified as pure seed. In the example, this value is 0.0%.
  • Noxious weeds: Expressed on the label as the number per pound or per ounce found in the seed lot. Weeds classified as noxious can vary by state and are difficult to manage even with proper chemical and cultural practices. In this example, none are specified, which is the best!
  • Inert matter: The percent by weight of all material in the seed container that will not grow. This value should be as low as possible because seed cost is based on bag weight—inert material contributes to bag weight but does not contribute any value in term of seed quality or purity. In this example, it is 0.86%.

Know before you buy!

Reading the label will help ensure that you not only get the best value on the seed you buy but that you will minimize the number of unwanted weeds in your lawn!

Article by Bob Wardwell, Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteer

 For More Information:

Replacing your lawn:

https://www.buncombemastergardener.org/lawn-replacement-lawn-new/

Carolina Lawns: A Guide to Maintaining Quality Turf in the Landscape https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/carolina-lawns

 

 

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Categories Lawns Tags fall garden chores, fescue grass, Kentucky bluegrass, lawn care, lawns, overseeding, seed label, seeds

It’s National Pollinator Week! Is Your Lawn Pollinator Friendly?

June 18, 2018

National Pollinator Week is June 18th through 24th with thousands of events planned across the country! Despite increased public awareness of the importance of pollinators and the value of pollinator-friendly gardens, our useful and fascinating pollinator friends continue to face huge challenges, especially lack of habitat.

Honey bee on clover_Andy Murray_CC BY-SA 2.0_Flickr
Honey bee on clover

What do pollinators need?
Pollinators need what all animals need: a place that offers healthy food, nesting/breeding sites, and over-wintering shelter. How can you help? Look no further than your own backyard—or for that matter, your front yard—to be part of the habitat solution.

Consider our lawns.
Did you know? Traditional lawns, a non-native monoculture, are the antithesis of a pollinator-friendly habitat.

According to Penn State Extension in their article Don’t Over Fertilize Your Lawn this Spring: 

“Turfgrass is slowly becoming one of the largest land covers or crops in the United States, covering 45 million acres. We use 800 million gallons of gasoline, 100 million tons of fertilizer, 70 million pounds of pesticides each year to maintain those lawns.”

The Earth Institute at Columbia University provides additional insight in their June 4, 2010, article The Problem of Lawns:

“Lawnmowers to maintain [American lawns] account for some 5 percent of the nation’s air pollution. Each year more than 17 million gallons of fuel are spilled during the refilling of lawn and garden equipment. Homeowners…typically use 10 times the amount of pesticide and fertilizers per acre on their lawns as farmers do on crops; the majority of these chemicals are wasted due to inappropriate timing and application. These chemicals then run off and become a major source of water pollution. Last but not least, 30 to 60 percent of urban fresh water is used on lawns. Most of this water is also wasted due to poor timing and application.”

Excessive and inappropriate use of fertilizers, oil, gasoline, and potable water to maintain lawns are damaging to our environment—our wildlife, plants, groundwater, streams/rivers, and ultimately our pollinating insects. From a pollinator’s perspective, when it comes to lawns, less is definitely more! Consider some options for transitioning a traditional lawn to a pollinator-friendly habitat.

Reduce high maintenance lawns and replace with pollinator-friendly borders
Less lawn, more pollinators

What to do? 

  • Reduce portions of lawn that struggle to survive, such as those in deep shade or on steep slopes.
  • Eliminate lawns that are tough to maintain, hard to access, such as those around trees and shrubs or narrow strips.
  • Remove a small, generic, unused front lawn and replace it with an interesting, diverse landscape that reflects your sense of style and place.
  • Replace portions of lawns with mixed borders and larger beds. The easiest way is to enlarge existing beds and borders or combine several smaller beds into one larger (easy to mow around) bed.
  • Incorporate edibles throughout your landscape so family and neighbors can see how pollinators dine on your flowers while helping to produce your fruits and veggies. What a deal!
  • Remember that more than 2/3 of North Carolina’s 400 bee species, including bumble bees, nest in the ground, so go easy on the mulch, particularly around the base of shrubs and grasses. Try some flowering groundcovers in place of mulch. Once established, they can save time and money while supplying more pollinator food and adding color and beauty.
  • Shift from a high-maintenance, perfect turf—more appropriate for athletic fields and golf courses—to a lawn that incorporates a mix of low-growing flowering plants. The University of Minnesota’s BeeLab trialed various grass seed mixes that incorporated both native and non-native flowering plants and showed particular success with white clover (Trifolium repens), self-heal (Prunella vulgaris lanceolata), and creeping thyme (Thymus serpyllum). Their publication, Flowering Bee Lawns for Pollinators, emphasizes the importance of picking the right flowers for the site and details how to add flowering plants to an established lawn.
  • Practice bee-friendly lawn care. A healthy lawn typically needs little watering, fertilizer, or pesticides.

–  Water established lawns only during drought.
–  Fertilizing can include leaving grass clippings, incorporating some nitrogen-fixing clover in your lawn, slow release organic fertilizers, and top-dressing with weed-free compost each year to provide needed nitrogen—and other nutrients as determined by a soil test.
–  Weed control is a challenge for naturally-maintained, pollinator-friendly lawns, but proper care of a healthy lawn can reduce weeds by 80% or more.

The payoff
As we celebrate National Pollinator Week with the gift of providing a healthy habitat, can we shift to perceiving great expanses of perfect bright green lawns as wasteful, missed opportunities for life-supporting landscapes? Can we welcome the clover blooming in our lawns as free fertilizer for the grass and food for the bees? Can we value a landscape that supports life rather than needing to be on life-support? 

Article written by Diane Almond, Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteer.

More information
Flowering Bee Lawns
by University of Minnesota BeeLab

Lawn Maintenance: How Much is the Right Amount?
by Debbie Green, Extension Master Gardener Volunteer

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Categories Lawns Tags lawn care, lawns, pollinators

Lawn Maintenance: How Much is the Right Amount?

August 26, 2016

How do you keep your lawn looking respectable year-round? You know you have to mow, but how much else do you need to do? Do you want a great lawn or a “good-enough” lawn? Here are tips on how to have the lawn you want.

Photo by Joey Williamson, Clemson Univ ExtensionMowing
Mowing is key to keeping your lawn presentable, no matter what! Your goal: keep your cool-season grasses three inches tall, mowing off no more than a third of the height at a time. Never let your lawn get above five inches. Grass may need mowing anytime of the year that temperatures get into the 70s.

Lawn growth varies wildly and individual lawns need individual evaluation. Overheard last week: “We’ve had so much rain that my husband is mowing the lawn every four days!” “Well, we’ve had so little rain that I haven’t mowed in three weeks!” Plan accordingly—fixed schedules won’t work!

Grasscycling
Many mowers will bag your cut grass, but you can save time and money—including on fertilizer—by leaving the clippings on the lawn. Mulching mowers keep the clippings small so they quickly dry out. Turf specialists estimate those clippings provide about 25 percent of the nutrients your lawn needs each year.

If your mower leaves clumps of cut grass, you may need to mow more often, or be sure the lawn is drier. Break up clumped clippings to avoid smothering the remaining lawn. If you bag or rake clippings, use them elsewhere in your garden or compost—hot composting will kill weed seeds!

Core Aerate LawnCore aeration
Aerating helps root growth in compacted soil and is worth doing, especially in years you overseed your lawn. Aerate this fall or when growth starts up again in the spring. Rent equipment that brings up small cores of lawn or hire someone to do the aeration. Just poking holes in the soil creates more compaction! Cores gradually break down—rake to break them up if they bother you. Mark irrigation system emitters and hoses so you do not damage them!

Watering
Lawns in active growth need consistent watering—an inch a week from rain or irrigation. Cool season grasses go dormant and brown up in the heat of summer. You may want to encourage dormancy to minimize maintenance. Dormant lawns may be able to go without rain for six weeks, but it is best to provide some watering every three weeks. Turf specialists advise that as little as ¼ inch may be enough.

Liming
Grass can’t effectively use nutrients if your soil is too acid. Many WNC lawns desperately need lime, but only a soil test will tell you how much. Lime takes awhile to work on soil pH—don’t expect immediate results. Test again in two or three years before liming again.

Fertilizer
Yearly nitrogen is a given, but some lawns need phosphorus, too—check your soil test! A lush lawn may require 2.5 to 3 pounds of nitrogen a year, but you can certainly use less, especially if you leave your grass clippings on the lawn. Plan to apply at least one pound of nitrogen every September and possibly another pound in October or November. If your lawn is still struggling, provide the remaining half-pound or pound in February. Fertilizing any later may lead to even lusher growth, but may make your lawn susceptible to fungal diseases come summer.

Dandelion weed in lawn
Dandelion weed in lawn

Weed management
With proper maintenance, you’ll find weeds aren’t as much of a problem. Identify your weeds. Pre-emergent herbicides can prevent crabgrass—an annual weed—from sprouting in bare spots. Decide if perennial weeds justify treatment. White clover may be a desirable addition to your lawn if you don’t need a uniform stand of grass. If you have a few dandelions, or other broadleaf weeds, try digging them out. Pervasive aggressive weeds may justify broadleaf herbicides.

Diseases and insects
There are many lawn ailments and pests, but with proper maintenance, damage is minimal, especially if you employ proper lawn maintenance practices. North Carolina State University provides many resources for identifying and treating lawn problems.

Article written by Debbie Green, Extension Master Gardener Volunteer.

Photo of woman mowing lawn courtesy of Joey Williamson, HGIC Horticulture Extension Agent, Clemson University,
http://www.clemson.edu/extension/hgic/plants/landscape/lawns/hgic1203.html

Free Lawn Care App:
http://www.lawncare.ncsu.edu/
Maintenance Calendar:
http://www.turffiles.ncsu.edu/turfgrasses/fine-fescue/lawn-maintenance
Organic Lawn Care:
http://www.turffiles.ncsu.edu/Files/Turfgrass/Articles/Bruneau_A/2008/Organic_Lawn_Care__A_Guide_to_Lawn_Maintenance_and_Pest_Management_for_North_Carolina.pdf
Weed ID:
http://turfid.ncsu.edu/

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Categories Lawns Tags aeration, fertilizer, fescue grass, lime, mowing

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