Fall Lawn Care – You Will Be Amazed What Needs To Be Done

If we want to maintain a beautiful lawn, we must properly maintain it in the fall and prepare responsibly before winter. Agronomist and landscape specialist Tautvydas Gurskas shares helpful advice on what to do during this period, the report says.
Where to start?

“Fall grass maintenance work should start in September. The first important step is to assess how dense the grass is, what felt is underneath. If we see yellow or brown felt after dividing the grass, it needs to be removed from the grass. This way, the roots will be able to breathe more easily, when the sun is shining, the growth will be faster and in the spring there will be no snow mold ”, says T. Gurskas.

According to the landscaping specialist, the felt should be removed by scarification or aeration. Scarification is the cutting of the soil to a depth of approximately 1 cm and the lifting of grasses and old leaves to the surface. It is done with a special device or scarification rake. During aeration, the floor is covered with an electric or mechanical aerator, hairpins or special shoes. Aeration helps ensure that grass roots receive oxygen and better absorb water. The simplest method is combing, which is suitable when the grass is in excellent condition and there is little felt. If the lawn area is small, you can simply comb the lawn with a simple rake.

All of the listed work is best done when the soil surface is dry. Otherwise, the tool blades will fail and the job will not produce a proper result.

Lawn fertilization

As T. Gurskas points out, the second but even more important step is to fertilize the lawn, whose habits should change already in early fall. In the fall, he advises to choose fertilizers with a high content of micro and macro elements and a certain amount of nitrogen. According to him, if we use fertilizers in the summer, they contain about 30 percent. nitrogen, that’s roughly September 15th. Fall fertilizers with 15-16 percent nitrogen should be chosen.

“Previously, the recommended amount of nitrogen in autumn fertilizers was around 3 percent, but long, warm autumns have been established in Lithuania for some time, which means that autumn lawns need a little more of this mineral. . Nitrogen is involved in protein synthesis, and in its absence, the lawn begins to “starve” and turn yellow in autumn, and in spring it is “tired” and ugly, “the agronomist talks about the correct choice of the composition of the fertilizer.

Another important element in the composition of fertilizers that it is proposed to pay attention to is sulfur. It is recommended that the sulfur fertilizer contains approximately 24%. This element has a disinfecting function and is therefore necessary to protect the lawn from snow mold.

According to T. Gurskas, the lawn should be fertilized with autumn fertilizers from mid-September, every month until the end of November.

Cut and water

As one landscaper points out, it’s also important to pay attention to a few things when preparing to mow your lawn. First, the surface of the soil must be dry before mowing the lawn. Second, the cutting height should be a little lower than in summer.

“When the weather cools down, you need to cut the grass underneath. It is recommended at a height of 2-3 cm that the emerging sun warms the soil surface more quickly and promotes the growth of new shoots and stems. At the end of autumn, I would advise leaving the lawn 4 cm high for the winter, as well as making sure that there is no moss, weeds, fallen leaves or fruit ”, advises the agronomist.

A landscaping specialist explains that in both summer and fall, care must be taken to keep the mower blades sharp. When mowing with a lawn mower, the grass will be “plowed” rather than mowed, leaving sores at the tips that can later disappear.

T. Gurskas also emphasizes that in autumn the lawn already has enough natural moisture: fog, more frequent rain, therefore the lawn should not be watered, and when it is even colder, the irrigation systems should be turned off completely.