Trouble getting lawn to grow healthy-Please help?

Hi Buel

I can't claim to be an expert, in fact I am struggling with grass myself at the moment. But a few things from my limited knowledge.

Re the weeds - really depends on your attitude to chemicals. The lawn weedkillers that you dilute and water on are excellent. I normally use once a year and my grass is virtually weed free. I will sometimes just spot treat individual weeds with a sprayer rather than watering over the whole lawn. If you want to avoid weedkillers then the dig 'em out method is your only answer.

The burnt appearance you have after applying mosskiller is the moss going black and dying. Rake most of this out if possible.

When using a spade or half moon to tidy the edges by the slabs go in at a slight angle so that you leave a small V shaped trench (half inch across, inch deep roughly) next to the slab. In a short time the grass will cover this and it allows somewhere for the run off from the slabs to accumulate rather than sitting on the edge of the slab.

Cutting after rain - only real reason not to is that if the surface is still wet then not only will it gum up your mower but walking on a wet lawn can cause problems of compaction and you could "puddle" the surface into mud.

I have reseeded using the Wilko's hard wearing seed, results are OK. I am still deciding which is best to cut short or leave a bit longer.

Neil

 

Weed and Feed is applied to the whole garden. It works out expensive if you only have weeds in a few areas. If you lawn is small you could get a pre-mixed hand sprayer [of selective lawn weed killer - NOT total weed killer like Glyphosate] and treat the Dandelions - or dig them out. Check the instructions, but normally they say to treat at least 3 days after mowing, and leave at least 3 days before mowing again]

I expect its obvious, but you use your half-moon cutter to make a cut an inch or so away from the slabs, so you leave a little gap between them, and an inch or two deep. You can then cut the "edge" that you have made with shears as the grass starts to grow across it.

 

Thank you all, that is incredibly helpful!
I have now bought grass seed, a half moon spade and a trowel to dig the blighters out!!
Im actually quite excited!! :wink:
Ps- Do you advise digging the weeds out as opposed to using the weedkiller?

 

"Do you advise digging the weeds out as opposed to using the weedkiller?"

If there are relatively few of them? definitely.

And more of the blighter will come back, and if you have the right tools you can tackle them one-by-one, and thus not have a gut of them in future :thumb:

 

Good advice, thank you for that! There are quite a few weeds/dandelions so i guess i should use the weedkiller granules then? It's just i was thinking that if i dig them all up one by one (which i dont mind) then i could immediately plant some grass seeds whereas if i used the weedkiller id have to wait a while before planting grass seeds?

 

Start doing it by hand, go for the bigger ones, and if you find there are too many, then you can use the weedkiller on the smaller ones. You will be suprised at how quickly you will find that they are not as prominent in the lawn, and it can be an on going process.

Hope this Helps!