by Frank Quinnette
1. On those nice days, clean up leaves, twigs, rocks and other debris from your lawn. Leaves and small twigs can be mowed and left on the lawn. Larger sticks and rocks, however, are blade bait!! Hitting a rock with a rotating piece of thick metal turning at a bazillion RPM will damage your equipment and is just plain dangerous to everything else when it shoots randomly out from under your mower.
2. Plan your garden now. Once you’ve determined how your planting beds will be shaped for the upcoming growing season you’ll know how much room you’re going to have for turf. So, with less turf to maintain, maybe you can get rid of that ancient 1960’s lawn tractor, buy a push mower and work on that New Year’s resolution about more exercise and stuff. Oh yes…you know who you are.
3. While we’re talkin’ mowers…now is a good time to drop yours off at the shop for some yearly and preventive maintenance. Getting a mower mechanic to even look at your broken down grass muncher during the turf growing season is near impossible. Call around. Some mower shops are begging for work right now. You may even be able to talk them into picking it up for you. Of course, if local laws allow, you’re secure in your sanity, and wear a helmet, just hop on that old rider and drive that baby over there yourself. For you single folks, nothing screams “I’m available” louder than using your riding mower for personal transportation.
4. Research. “Google” some turf products! Now is a great time to look at all the latest and greatest turf products out there. Did you notice that all the seed and plant companies are sending you ads now? Hmmm….
5. If you did not get a chance to put down that winter fertilizer application on your lawn, don’t bother. The state of DE does not want fertilizer applied from Dec. 15 through Feb 15. The potential for frozen ground that keeps nutrients from reaching intended targets and therefore runs off with any winter precipitation, is a far greater threat to the environment than your grass not being greener come spring. So, you can work on that other resolution to be more organized and plan better for next fall.
6. One last thing. Here’s a grass seeding tip I’ve heard from lots of experts, lots of times, “sow your grass seed just before the last snow of the season.” Brilliant huh? The melting snow helps work the seed into the soil, waters it, and provides a useful amount of nutrients. Hey! It makes sense to me! There’s one small problem here I can’t quite work out. Which is the last snow?!? If I could figure that out I’d be in Atlantic City right now at a roulette wheel. And just try keeping the birds off of it
So, enjoy your winter. Leave any of your turf questions as a comment on this post and I’ll try answer to answer them. In the mean time, just remember, spring is around the corner and all that white stuff will be off your green stuff soon enough. I’ll catch up with you then.
