Lawn Garden Sprinklers

So you have owned your property for a number of years now and just realised you have a garden out there to attend to. It is never too late to start caring for you lawn, but special attention must be given if you want to be successful.

Lawn care is not just about feeding nutrients, watering and mowing on a regular basis. Without any control on these aspects, you may begin to see negative effects.

The following are general tips you should consider when maintaining your lawn:

Mowing

To manage your mowing habits, you must consider the behavior of your lawn. This will differ according to the temperature, season and location. But points to consider are frequency of mowing, length of grass and the lawn mower itself.

Grass will grow quicker or slower at different seasons of the year, so therefore frequency of mowing is affected, which in turn affects the length of grass. Most lawns are often mowed too short or not enough. Mowing with a blunt blade is also very bad for the lawn.

Aeration

Like us humans and most other living species, grass needs air to breathe and water to absorb. This can be achieved by regularly driving a fork into the lawn, opening up the soil, thus giving the lawn more breathing space.

Thatch Control

Thatch is the layer of dead and decaying matter at the base of living roots. This problem can be alleviated by scarifying or raking the lawn.

Watering

The most obvious is sufficient watering. Watch out especially in the summer period for prolonged dry spells where growth can be affected.

I wish I had indulged my yard in a little tender-loving fall lawn care. Today I’m looking out my window at an all-too familiar Midwestern winter. Snow for Christmas and then a few days of warmth melted the insulating blanket away, leaving my lawn bare and susceptible to the terrors of an after-thaw ice storm.

It’s easy in the warm spring to roll up our sleeves and get out the rakes, aerators, spreaders and mowers. After all, we can celebrate putting away the snow shovels and snow blower! However, although spring lawn care is important, a good fall lawn care program ensures that we’ll have a lawn to tend when spring rolls around!

I could have started my fall lawn care with a final mowing. However, the grass seemed to quit growing… so I quit mowing. Silly me! A final mowing, lowering my mower blade about

Many homeowners have dogs, and one of their most common questions is how can I have a beautiful lawn as well as a dog? If your dog is using your lawn to urinate on, then the simple answer is you cannot. Dog damage to lawns creates circular spots caused by urine burns.

Generally it is the female and young males, which cause the greatest damage. This has nothing to do with the fact they are female, or young males, urine is urine. It has more to do with the way in which they urinate.

Adult male dogs will urinate on shrubs, or areas around power poles, playground equipment or fence posts. They do this to mark their territory. Females tend to squat while urinating, causing a greater concentration on one area. Because of the high concentration of salt and urea, it causes a circular dead spot. Normally a ring of healthy grass will surround the dead patch. This is caused by nitrogen in the dog’s urine, which acts as a fertilizer.

PREVENTING DOG DAMAGE:

Having one certain area such as a graveled dog run goes a long way to keeping the majority of your lawn green and healthy. If you are unable to provide such an area, watering immediately after dilutes the urine and may prevent the damage from occurring. This must be done soon after the dog urinates, or this is ineffective.

REPAIRING DOG DAMAGED LAWNS:

Areas of grass, which have been damaged by dogs, have a very high concentration of salts, nitrogen, and urea. Generally if you put down seed in these areas, it will not germinate. You must first water the damaged areas to leach out as much of the chemicals as possible. Roughly rake out the dead area, and then add appropriate seed to the damaged area. Top dress with approximately

Summer officially gives way to autumn on the 22nd of September, which is known as the autumnal equinox, but for the lawn owner autumn begins much earlier. This is because the green keeping tasks for autumn begin from the 1st day of September.

Your first task is to make changes to your mowing method, I would suggest raising the height of cut by 1cm above your summer mowing height which will give you an ultimate mowing height of 3cm (1 ¼ inches). The reason why you raise the cut to this height in autumn is to allow for the slowing of grass growth, on top of this I would usually mow just once a week once this growth begins to slow.

Should your lawns suffer from slow growth in the spring or during dry spells in the summer you may consider applying an autumn lawn feed to develop strong roots and hardiness. If you feel your lawn is not all it should be and would benefit from this autumn pampering then by all means apply the fertiliser but ensure it is specially formulated for autumn application, an autumn lawn feed such as this contains phosphates and potash whilst omitting nitrogen which would cause unwanted growth.

Many gardens may have goalmouths and beaten paths to washing lines that are tread-bare, sparsely populated by grass or compacted. Address these now to have them ship-shape for next season, start by driving the prongs of a garden fork approx 15cm (6 inches) into the compacted turf at various points throughout the affected area. This is a form of aeration, which allows more air to reach the grass plants roots on compacted soils.

To thicken up your grass sward in these high traffic areas we must introduce fresh seed, so firstly we must create a seedbed. Add a light layer of clean loamy topsoil (This is available bagged in most garden centres), rake this with a flat garden rake to the consistency of large cake crumbs and follow this by shaking on some lawn seed at a rate of 40 to 50g per square metre. Tamp down lightly with the flat of the rake to ensure firm seed-soil contact, alternatively on large areas use a light garden roller.

The article gives you systematic instructions for making sure that your lawn mower is usable when the spring arrives and you require your lawn mower once again. If you do not take these minor precautions, the left over fuel in carburetor will make your lawn mower unusable at the end of winter.

Protect Your investment

After you rake out all the leaves, do not relax. Remember Robert Frost. There are miles to go before you sleep and miles (well not exactly) to go before your lawn mower is allowed to sleep. Unless you do it, your lawn mower might be put to a longer sleep. It may not wake up when winter goes away, and when you need your lawn mower most.

The How of Lawn Mower Winterizing

Gasoline in the carburetor of your lawn mower, does not take kindly to lowered temperatures of winter. The gasoline gums up and when you try to restart it after the winter, there s no gasoline flow to your engine and it does not start. You will not be able to do the maintenance by yourself. You will lose time and money making the trip to your friendly neighborhood mechanic. You get all this, for not following up simple steps of winterizing your lawn mower. Avoid all this winterize your lawn mower.

The How of Lawnmowers Winterizing

There are some simple steps for winterizing your lawn mower. You can do it your self without involving any one else.

1. The first thing to do is to remove the gasoline in the tank. This can be done by siphoning the contents in the in a plastic can. Usually a single gallon container should be sufficient.

2. Keep the can tightly closed after decanting contents of the lawn mower. Place the can in such a way that it cannot topple over and spill the content.

3. If you use the same grade of gasoline in your car, transfer the content to the car tank, it is much safer that way, or transfer it to winter heating system if that is possible instead of storing gasoline in a can.

4. Run the engine until the remaining fuel is completely consumed and engine stops on its own.

5. Drain gearbox oil and crank case oil. Dispose off the oil as per guidelines from municipal authorities for disposal of hazardous waste or hand it over to municipal authorities for doing it. NEVER, EVER, dump it in sewer or on ground.

6. Remove the spark plug, put lubricating oil (about 50 milliliter) through the opening, and crank up the engine using the rope, so the piston and crankshaft is lubricated.

7. Ensure that you are wearing hand gloves before you do any of the following activities and take safety precautions to avoid any injury to your hands.

8. Turn over the engine and clean the undersides of the lawn mower to remove traces of grass, muck attached to the blades and clean the working parts of lawn mower. Remove any foreign material lodged between blade and body.

9. With a small piece of steel wool, clean all the underside areas and remove any rest from the covers and body of the lawn mower.

10. Apply protective solution like WD-40 to the cleaned up surfaces

11. If required, remove, sharpen and refit the blade, and turn the lawn mower to its normal position.

12. Change the air filter and the oil filter. If it is possible to clean the air filter, you can do so, but if it is made of paper, it must be replaced. The air filters and oil filters can also be replaced just before re-using the lawn mower, but it pays to do this while winterizing as you might forget doing so before starting.

13. Fill up the tires with air and wheel it to its resting place for winter

When spring arrives and the grass is ready to be cut, fill up the fuel tank with gasoline and start up. Your old faithful lawn mower will purr into motion and you will be ready for your lawn maintenance. It will purr like a contented cat.

We think nothing of the computers in our cars. Who hasn’t at least heard of the robotic floor sweepers? Yet for some reason Americans have not yet embraced the one of the greatest home labor saving devices, the robotic lawn mower.

Robotic lawn mowers can cut a yard very efficiently. The software is designed to take into account various types of grass and growing conditions.

The Lawnbott Evolution is particularly sensitive to how fast the grass is growing. Every time it mows it will sense how much resistance is against the blade to try and determine how fast the grass is growing. When it goes back to the charger it will calculate the next time it needs to come out to keep the grass at the optimal height. In other words it will come out more in May than in October.
The new Robomower RL1000 models now match the Lawnbott robotic mowers with rain sensors. So they will not attempt to mow in the rain. The LawnBott takes it a step further with a wet grass detection system, if the grass it too wet it goes back to the charger automatically.

Robotic mowers can be programmed to mow any time day or night. They can be told what days to come out or to stay in. So they can automatically mow during the week while the kids are in school or at night when everyone is in bed, or not mow on the weekends.
They can mow in different patterns so as to cut the grass in different directions. They don’t leave the patterns in the yard like traditional mowers. The yard looks always crew-cut smooth.
Robotic mowers prefer to cut more often, they put much less stress on the grass and keep weeds from seeding. Robotic lawn mowers cut just the very tip of the grass so it falls to the ground as ready fertilizer. Virtually every lawn care website states how important that it is to reuse grass clippings.
Reducing water and fertilizer use is also is also important. Too much water and fertilizer can lead to too rapid of growth which will cause thatch.

Robotic lawn mowers use no gas or oil, they are very environmentally friendly. It is estimated that it costs only $7.00 a year to mow the average lawn with a robotic lawn mower. Mother Nature can’t help but smile at that!
The Robotic lawn mower is a proven technology, with over 5 years of in-home use world wide.

Description on cordless electric lawnmowers. Have you got any question on cordless lawn mowers?, just read this article and you will learn the bases on these new innovative lawnmowers.

Most cordless electric lawnmowers have ups and downs on the mowers market. It is due to these specific lawn mowers have experienced so many breakdowns in the last years. Customers are dissatisfied upon electric lawnmowers even though the idea is really brilliant. Several companies invested in making cordless lawnmowers such as Ryobi, Black & Decker and Toro manufacturers . But they have discontinued manufacturing those models because of slow demand.

Most electric work with 24V NiCad lawnmower batteries. They are able to keep working between 1 up to 2 hours for specific models. The main advantage of cordless, is that we don’t have to deal with the hassle of dragging around an extension cord. This becomes a big problem when we work on relative big yards. Therefore, they performs properly on the field without cords.

On the other hand, there exists similar but at the mean time much more different lawn mowers, corded electric lawnmowers. They are actually less expensive than cordless electric lawnmowers due to the battery is missed. They are plugged in at all time, this is the most important disadvantage. We have to deal with the cord, trying to drag it around.

Robotic and electric lawn mowers

Nowadays, innovative lawn mowers are being designed by leading electric lawn mowers manufacturers. Robotic lawnmowers, are basically cordless mowers. We can leave them alone over the grass and by just setting up a positional system, the robot will mow the grass while we are watching TV, isn’t it perfect?All in all, we don’t recommend in buying these lawnmowers, even though they are on the market, we think that they still are just prototypes.

Your lawn needs the right amount of water to grow. However, you should not water your lawn blindly. The frequency and amount water needed for your lawn depend on various factors including the type of grass, soil, climate and many others.

Here are five simple watering tips you can follow to make your lawn shine.

1. Water to a depth of 6-8 inches

Grass roots usually grow to a depth of six to eight inches. Applying water that penetrates beyond eight inches is wasteful. On the other hand, penetrating less than six inches can result in a shallow-rooted lawn that is weak and require more efforts to maintain.

For a quick test, use a screwdriver to probe the lawn ground. Once you feel that it is hard to probe further, pull out the screwdriver and check. Alternatively, buy a soil probe from the local nursery and use it to remove small cores of soil, which you can feel to see how wet they are.

2. Allow the lawn to dry out partially

You should give your lawn ample time to dry out partially before watering it again. This will create a good air-moisture relationship that promotes healthy roots. Before you start watering again, take a walk on your lawn and observes your footprints. The grasses will not spring right back if they lack water. If the grasses changed to a dull color, this is also another indication that your lawn needs water.

3. Water in short interval

If you water too fast, the lawn will not be able to absorb it and excess water will run off into the streets or other places. This is a waste of water and should be avoided. Try watering for fifteen minutes and then stop. Wait for ten minutes to let the water soak in. Then repeat the process again until the water has penetrated to a depth of six to eight inches.

4. Water in the early morning

Water your lawn in the early morning is a wise choice. The weather is usually cool and clam. The humidity is also high and there will be less evaporation. Your lawn also has ample time to dry off before nightfall. A wet lawn in the night can cause lawn diseases to spread quickly.

5. Record your observation and adjust accordingly

Get a notebook or journal and record your watering activity on a daily basis for at least three months. Note down the time of watering, the amount of water used and the intervals between each watering session.
Observe how your lawn respond to your watering practice and record the result in your journal.

If your lawn does not dry out enough between watering, increase the interval. If you discover that the water is not penetrating to the required depth, apply more water. Record all these observation into your journal. You should also make small changes to your watering practice and record the results.

Over time, you will be able to water your lawn with greater efficiency as you adjust your watering practice based on your recorded observation. As a result, you will have a lawn that continues to shine and grow healthily without having to put in more maintenance efforts than necessary.

Constant vigilance is the best way to keep weeds under control. You should never allow the weed to flower or set seed.

1. Couch Grass – This perennial weed is found in beds and borders. It is being spread by underground stems with small fibrous roots at every joint.

It is hard to eliminate by cultivation; however, constant hoeing will exhaust the perennial root system. Remove by hand the moment you notice them. Use a fork in order to avoid cutting up the stems, because even a small part left in the soil will immediately create another plant.

Frequent close mowing will kill off the majority of infestations in the first season. Spray with a systemic weed killer, such as one that contains glyphosate.

2. Creeping Buttercup – This spreading perennial weed is very aggressive and can take over large areas. In the lawn it creates a rosette at soil level; for this reason, it is not affected by mowing. It spreads by runners that creep along and takes root at intervals, forming new plants.

This weed is sensitive to all weed killers so it is easy to control it in the lawn. Spraying with one that contains 2,4-d, such as Verdone will eliminate this weed.

3. Daisy – This weed can stand close mowing and still flower. It is spread by seed so can colonize the lawn quickly.

They are fairly easy to eliminate because they are susceptible to weed killers and one application is typically enough to kill them. If infestations are sparse then weed them out using a hand fork known as a daisy grubber.

4. Dandelion – This perennial weed has large rosettes and bright yellow flower head. It can stand close mowing so hand weeding it typically is the best control method. However, the long tap root needs to be removed, as new plants will form from them. A long probe, two-pronged fork is specially made for the purpose of removing them.

You can pour salt on to the centre of the weed; this will kill the weed overnight; then remove it by hand. Spraying with weed killer will also do the job.

5. Moss – This is the most troublesome weed in the lawn. It is a tiny non-flowering plant. To permanently remove it, the basic principles of good lawn maintenance must be meticulously followed. Apply a moss killer in spring and autumn.

Do not cut the grass too short; also, your grass should not be too long; reduce shade on the lawn. And most importantly, scarify and aerate the lawn in autumn.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT SPRINKLER Sprinklers come in 4 basic designs. Each of these sprinkler types has their advantages and disadvantages. Lawn size, frequency of watering and soil types are all important factors when choosing which type of sprinkler is best for you.

Of the 4 basic designs a stationary or fixed sprinkler is probably the worst type you can purchase. These types of sprinklers work best for spot watering or used in conjunction with another sprinkler system.

Varying flow rates are this type of sprinkler’s greatest disadvantage. At the outside edge of the spray pattern the grass can receive upwards of 6-8 inches of water while at the base it may only receive 2 inches of water per hour. This is due to the water being directed through the fixed pattern of small holes in the base.

Oscillating sprinklers use a curved piece of metal or plastic with small holes that move back and forth to deliver the water in a rectangular pattern. By pausing when the spray is furthest away this sprinkler does a better job of delivering the water in a more effective pattern.

More up to date models will allow you to adjust this pattern as well as adjusting the width of the spray. Revolving sprinklers use one or more arms to throw the water in a circular pattern. This type of sprinkler has a fairly decent radius but suffers in the uniformity of the water being delivered to the lawn.

Generally speaking the majority of the water is delivered to an area 4-9 feet out. For a large area an impulse or impact sprinkler is a good choice. By using a combination of a jet internally and a hammer externally this sprinkler can shoot jets of water in a circular pattern. On many models the head is adjustable from a fine mist to a strong pulse or anything in between. Coverage is good with this type of sprinkler.

One of the more odd sprinkler systems is what is known as a traveling sprinkler. I haven’t come across too many of these which is too bad. This system while looking a little bizarre gives good thorough coverage and excellent rates of moisture. The sprinkler follows the hose or track laid out by the homeowner. By varying the hose pattern you get excellent coverage. The pressure of the water exiting the rotating arms propels the unit along. For most homeowners the choice for a sprinkler system would be an in-ground system. By installing the sprinkler heads at key locations you ensure uniform coverage and excellent water delivery.

Most units come with a timer to make watering your lawn even more convenient. Some models also incorporate a sensor to let the system know if it has been raining to curb the cost of your watering bill. The spray heads pop up from the lawn when activated and return to their almost hidden position when finished. When having your lawn aerated ensure the heads are clearly marked to avoid damage to them while the lawn is being aerated.