Tips on Maintaining Your Lawn

Maintaining the lawn is like maintaining your hair. It better be done right, or you'll look foolish. Ultimately, maintaining a lawn will be one of the biggest challenges to homeowners everywhere. Consider the following to ease your endeavors.

1. Don't overdo the weed-killer on the lawn in the summer.

Weeds are the enemy of homeowners and lawns. I could relate because my family hated weeds. During summer days in the past, our entire family went out to the lawn and pulled weeds. Of course, I told them hundreds of times that the weeds are not going to go away. In fact, they didn't go away. No matter how much crabgrass you pull or how many gallons of weed-killer you apply, you are not going to ever eliminate them completely.

Two factors play into this weed dilemma. First, lawn grass do not thrive well in scorching summer heat. In fact, you'll notice that grass grows the most slowly during this time. This is due to the fact that plants close off their stomata, which are tiny holes used to collect carbon dioxide, during summer heat. Because plants cannot grow without carbon dioxide, their growth stagnates.

Second crabgrass thrives because their are genetic adapted to the temperature. At the scientific level, weeds and crab-grass are known as C4 plants. Without getting into too much detail, it means that weeds thrive in the summertime and grass doesn't.

Therefore, using the weed-killer in the summer means that you might accidentally kill good grass which won't grow back. The weeds that you kill will grow back on your lawn as they are genetically designed to thrive in warm climates. In the end, using too much weed-killer just kills grass and doesn't solve a thing.

2. Plant flowers.

The major weakness in any lawn is the lack of originality. Even if you have managed to maintain the perfect lawn with no weeds, it will still look plain. In personal experience, I have found that planting flowers is the real factor that elicits the "wow" responses from passer-by that homeowners want.

Try planting flowers corresponding to the season. Try planting bold colored flowers, such as tulips or impatiens. The benefit of flowers is that they drag attention from weeds, making your life as the homeowner a lot less difficult. Furthermore, impressing flowers and bold colors will make your lawn a superstar.

From my understanding, lawns are all about pride, and flowers are the perfect way to augment this.

3. Check the weather often for rainy days.

Many times, I have found that mother nature will water the lawn for me. Therefore, it is very important to check the weather daily for forecasts of rain. Often times, you can be saved from the hassle of watering your plants depending on where you live.

Letting rain do the watering saves you, the homeowner, on water bills and it prevents any type of over-watering that might occur. Mother nature will help in maintaining your lawn.

4. Check the soil's acidity.

If you're really feeling serious about maintaining your lawn, you might consider purchasing a pH probe. A pH probe measures the acidity or basicity of the lawn. Having soil that is either too acidic or too basic can stagnate growth, which causes many unpleasant dead patches of grass. Thus, it is very important to neutralize the soil it ever becomes so. Sometimes, having soil that is too acidic or too basic is even worse than having weeds as it stagnates life.

If you find that your soil is too basic, apply peat moss to the soil. If you find that your soil is too acidic, apply some lime. Overall, maintaining the soil's pH levels is another important factor that plays into maintaining your lawn.

Lawns are key in the neighborhood. It's a matter of household honor, and maintaining your lawn is going to be top priority.