Having a lawn doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice your commitment to Earth-friendly practices to a sea of fertilizers, herbicides and other chemicals. A healthy lawn is within your reach using organic lawn care principles.
Healthy turf isn’t the result of chemistry, but of principled growing practices and taking a different approach to lawn care. While making the change from a traditionally maintained lawn to an organic one takes some effort, you’ll develop a stronger, healthier lawn.
- Overseed: Once your sod takes root, it’s time to start thinking about over-seeding. By continually seeding your lawn, you’re helping your turf grow more thickly, squeezing out room for weeds to germinate. Ideally, you’ll overseed with the same species you laid sod with. The most successful organic gardeners choose different mixes of seeds to suit the sun conditions (full sun or partial shade) for the area you’re seeding.
- Mow Responsibly: Your mowing habits have an impact on your lawn’s health that you may not recognize. Start by raising your blade height: Longer grass requires less water than close-cropped turf. It’s also more effective at keeping dandelions and other weeds from taking root.
Kick your old-fashioned bagging mower to the curb and get a mulching mower. Not only will you divert yard waste from the landfill, you’re also feeding your lawn in the process. Mulched clippings compost and return up to 25% of their nutrients to your turf. It’s like adding fertilizer every time you mow. - Strengthen Your Soil: Like any plant, turf pulls nutrients from the soil, which eventually needs to be enriched to continue to support your lawn. Adding compost to your yard brings nutrients back and helps topsoil retain water. Rake out compost into your turf , applying a quarter of an inch throughout the lawn.
- Water Deep: Encourage your turf’s roots to stretch deep into the soil by providing deep, less frequent watering. Deep watering protects against evaporation and helps lawns be more drought tolerant.
For best results, you’ll also need to treat your lawn with organic fertilizers a couple times a year, typically in fall and spring as you would with traditional fertilizers. By tending to your lawn with the same level of attention you would using traditional lawn care methods, you’ll be able to grow happy, healthy turf with organic lawn care methods.
