Natural Green Lawn

You guys have probably figured it out by now, but I am a big fan of natural lawn care. There are many reasons for that, but before I talk about it, let me tell you about my lawn care experiences over the years. You see, I started my first lawn business at the age of 16. Prior to that I did some lawn mowing here and there, but it wasn’t until I started thinking about buying a car that I really saw a way to cash in on the lawn care business. Back then, none of use really cared much about the environment or keeping within some kind of “green” or “eco-friendly” practice. We (me and the other kids in the neighborhood) just wanted to make some money and get the lawns cut as fast as possible so we could get paid and hit the movies or whatever!

Now let’s fastforward about 20 years to where I am now. I am the operations manager for a very large lawn fertilization outfit in Chicago. (Can’t tell you the name due to non-compete issues). I am a licensed pesticide applicator in both Illinois and Indiana and I have walked on over 10,000 lawns during my days in the business. If it can happen to a lawn, I have seen it, from Florida where I started as a kid to the midwest where I work now.

What are the advantages of a natural lawn?

First off guys, having a lawn that is treated with natural products or methods is going to last longer and stay greener and healthier for the long haul. This is because treating your lawn organically/naturally is going to yield very slow, sustainable results instead of fast results. Let me illustrate:

If you feed your kids candy what happens? They get an immediate burst of hyper energy that ends quickly in a crash. The same goes for your lawn. If you use the wrong synthetically produced high nitrogen fertilizers, your lawn will green up very quickly and grow super fast, but crash very soon. This is because high nitrogen synthetic fertilizers release nutrients fast; I mean very fast guys, but they really do nothing to help grass plants develop strong roots in the process. So essentially what you get with synthetic fertilizers like Scott’s or K-Grow is a fast green that cannot support itself in the long term because there are no root structures to maintain it. So the lawn continues to need heavy doses of nitrogen to sustain its green appearance.

Now let’s talk about a lawn that is treated with slow release natural fertilizers. Yep, that’s right, natural organic fertilizers are naturally slow releasing. That’s really the first  and biggest advantage. You see, synthetic fertilizers release nutrients (mainly nitrogen) when they get wet, which is why you are told to “water in the fertilizer.” But that means the nutrients get washed into the soil all in one big shot, fast. But organic or natural fertilizers release their nutrients by naturally breaking down over time. The main thing needed for organic fertilizers to release nutrients is heat. And when the temps do hit a level enough for the nutrients to break down and release, they do it slowly, over time, meaning the grass roots get the slow treatment too. Slow release means slow growth, steady as she goes.

Finally, a lawn that grows slowly will also sustain that growth for a much longer period of time. That means that you really need to do little to the grass once it gets to a certain point, naturally!

It seems that these days all the buzz is around “being green” and of course what better way to do that than through your lawn care practices. But what is “green” lawn care anyway?

Well guys, I gotta be honest and tell you that there is no clear definition of green, responsible lawn care. It really depends on who you are talking to, what their experiences are, and where they learned turf care. But since this is my lawn care tips blog, I figure I will give you my own opinions which have been formulated over nearly 20 years of turf care experience.

Integrated Pest Management And Natural Lawn Care

First off, there is no way to go 100% organic or natural in you lawn care regimen and expect to get top results. (by top results I mean a thick, green, weed free lawn). There is NO ORGANIC WEED KILLER! If anyone tells you that, they are flat out selling you snake oil! In addition, there is no such thing as a 100% weed free lawn! Weeds will always come back into your grass during any given year because of factors out of your control; ie: that neighbor that does nothing at all for his grass.

So this brings us to Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and your lawn care regimen. Basically, IPM is a thought process whereby we only use chemical control (non natural) when pest pressure (in this case the best is weeds) exceeds amounts that we are “willing to deal with.” Now, farmers will use IPM in a different way that you and me as homeowners, but that is not the point here.

The point is that if you are going to “go green” with your lawn, you will need to be willing to accept “some” weeds in your lawn. In addition, when you do spray those weeds with a herbicide, you don’t use a blanket application, rather a targeted, or spot-sprayed application. This is the essence of IPM when it comes to erradcating weeds in your lawn: SPOT SPRAY ONLY!

This also means that you don’t have to break out the pump sprayer every time a dandelion or thistle pops up either. If you want to be natural in your lawn care, who says you can’t pull weeds by hand? Afterall, it doesn’t take that much effort to do so, and pulling weeds is very environmentally friendly! Get your hands dirty guys!

Lawn Fertilization; natural and organic

There is a lot that I could ramble about when it comes to properly using fertilizer on your lawn with an eye on the environmental angle. In short, if you choose to use 100% natural or organically derived fertilizers, you should expect to get very slow, yet sustainable results. What I mean by that is organic fertilizers will NOT release nutrients in colder temperatures, and even so, they release slowly when it is hot.

In addition, when you use an organic fertilizer like Milorganite, you have to put down heavy amounts to make any difference. Personally, I am fine with putting down 15 lbs per 1,000 sq feet of lawn space when using Milorganite, but to the average homeowner, it will feel like you are applying it with a snow shovel!

This is, in fact, the biggest problem most homeowners encounter when applying natural or organic lawn fertilizers: that bein they don’t put down enough. You guys are so worried about burning your lawn, so you dial back the amounts not realizing organics won’t burn anyway.

I guess that is all I have to say today, but the key is following along with my program and understanding the organic lawn care takes time, hard work and most of all, patience! If you do that, you will eventually have a lawn just like mine pictured here: 99% organic!