October Lawn Care Tips

With cooler temperatures, October is a great time of year for you to winterize your lawn with fertilizer and herbicide. Winterizing your lawn will strengthen the root system and continue to kill the root system of existing broad-leaf weeds. To learn more about winterizing your lawn, click here.

With the cooler temperatures watering frequency can be reduced. Halloween is a great day to drain your sprinkler system. We never get cold enough temperatures to damage your sprinkler system before December. This is a great time of year to allow your lawn to repair itself in areas where you weren't getting enough water.

You can cut your watering down a little (in frequency not depth), from 2 - 3 times a week to 1 -2 times a week.

It is important to water deeply and only as needed to force a deep root system, strengthen your lawn, and help prevent new weeds! If you haven't been able to do this over the heat of the summer, now is a great time to recover your lawn (due to the ideal growing temperatures for your grass).

If properly trained, a good deep, even watering (about 10 inches of moist soil), between one and two times a week will be sufficient for your lawn. However, it may be necessary (if your soil is dry) to water more frequently during an especially dry and/or hot spell.

How do I know if my soil is dry?

First, look for a smoky green that doesn't spring back quickly when stepped upon. You can confirm dryness by probing the soil with a screwdriver. If it is relatively hard to push in and moist soil doesn't stick to the probe, it's too dry. Another option is to probe with a shovel, and pry forward a little to expose the roots. This allows you to see the soil as well and easily check for moistness.

Read more about drought

With cooler weather, it may be necessary to mow more frequently. It is still helpful to mow at the second to the highest setting (2 1/2 to 3 inches long). To insure that you don't remove too much green, mow off only 1/3 of the blade at a time, since most of the green in your lawn is located in the top portion of the blade.

This will help to:

• conserve water
• strengthen the root system
• help crowd out potential weeds

With the peak of the summer annual weed season behind us, crabgrass, spurge, and other summer annual weeds should begin to thin out. Cooler temperatures slow weed growth, and freezing temperatures will kill those summer-annual weeds.

This is a great month to apply a winterizing application with herbicide to continue to kill the root system of any remaining broad-leaf weeds.

Any existing (perennial) grassy weeds such as orchardgrass would need to be sprayed with a non-selective herbicide such as Roundup and the lawn replanted in that area.

Contact us and we'll winterize your lawn with fertilizer and herbicide for you!

To find out more about winterizationclick here

• Clover

• Crabgrass

• Dandelions

• Mallow

• Morning Glory

• Orchardgrass

• Thistle

• Violets

• Yarrow

While most insects have stopped damaging lawns at this time, it is still useful to know how to recognize an insect problem

How do I know if I have an insect problem?

If you see an area of your lawn turning brown, check for insects. Pull on these areas with your whole hand. If insects are at fault, it will pull up like rug and you will see little white larvae on the soil.

How do I solve my insect problem?

To control the problem, apply insecticide directly to the affected areas and check back weekly for improvement. Repeat this until all signs of insect activity are gone. This means that the brown spots have stopped spreading, there is evidence of new growth, and the larvae are lethargic or dead.

If you see signs of insect damage, give us a call and we'll be out right away to treat the problem on a weekly basis till the insects are dead.

• Billbugs

• Sod Webworm

This is a peak season for rust and powdery mildew. Most other diseases tend to fall out at this time of year. As with all disease, prevention is the best method. Water deeply and as needed, to cut down on blade humidity as much as possible, and aerate on a regular basis. This will help cultivate an environment that is unfriendly to disease.

If you do see signs of rust or powdery mildew, give Turf Plus a call and we'll come out and take care of it for you!