Fall Lawn Care Tip: Find Out Your Grass Type Cool-season turf grasses are so called because they thrive in the cool weather usually associated with spring and autumn. Examples are rye grass, the fescues (both "fine" and "tall" kinds), Kentucky blue grass and bent grass.
By contrast, warm-season turf grasses grow most actively when the weather is warm, which is why they are the preferred grass types of the South in the U.S. Some of their names even make you think "South," as is the case with Bermuda grass and Saint Augustine grass.Other kinds include zoysia grass and buffalo grass.
To be sure, there will be some fall lawn maintenance you'll have to do regardless of the type of grass on your lawn. Let's look at these tasks first:
- Apply herbicides to broadleaf weeds
- Correct soil pH: if your lawn is not performing well, have your soil tested. If the soil test should show a need to reduce acidity, apply lime now. If alkalinity needs to be reduced, apply sulfur.
- Thatch removal: dethatch your lawn, by raking; for bad cases of soil compaction, you may have to employ the technique known as core aeration, for which lawn equipment known as "aerators" can be bought or rented
- Rake leaves, or use a leaf vacuum, lest the leaves smother your grass over the winter
- Lawn equipment care: make sure to drain old gas out of lawn mowers after last mowing
- Watering during hot, dry spells
- brown Fertilization
- Setting lawn mower height
Information from http://landscaping.about.com/cs/lawns/a/fall_lawns
Till next week, this is Becky Litterer from Becky's Greenhouse, Dougherty Iowa