Why buy new furniture if you can improve the old furniture? When you invest in good quality furniture, you don’t have to throw it away as soon as the fabric starts to fade. With reupholstering and refinishing, your old furniture can look as good as new. I revitalize my old furniture all the time. If you want to stop thinking of your expensive furniture as disposable and start thinking of it as something that you can periodically improve, you’re on the right track. I started this blog to provide you with tips and tricks for reupholstering, refinishing, and upgrading your old furniture.
If you walk through your lawn and see cracks in the soil and dead patches of grass everywhere, you know how these things can turn a beautiful lawn into something unsightly. Fortunately, there are things you can do to take care of these problems. Read the information below to learn how you can have your lawn looking beautiful and green again.
Why You Get Cracks
First, determine the type of soil you have. Because you have cracks, your soil is likely clay. The clay particles in this soil are like a sponge in that they swell when they soak up water from a rain and then shrink when the soil dries out. If you go through a dry spell, this shrinkage can be bad enough that you will see cracks on your lawn. The soil becomes very compacted, which makes it become rock hard once it dries out and almost impossible to work with.
You can take a sample of your soil to your local extension office to determine the soil type you have.
How to Fix the Problem
To take care of your dry soil problem, you have to loosen up the compacted soil, and to do this, you need to use an aerator. Aerating your lawn will not damage it in any way. How you aerate depends on the type of aerator you purchase or rent. Because an aerator is not something you will use often or may not ever use again, renting one from a home supply store or garden center is a good idea.
As you run the aerator over your lawn, it removes plugs of soil, which will allow water, air, and nutrients to penetrate the grass roots. This also makes the grass roots stronger. When you finish aerating, your lawn will be full of holes, but this will only be for a short time. This is because once the soil starts loosening up, the soil will fill in the holes.
Plant grass seed over the holes once they fill with soil. Because your lawn has dead patches, you will need to plant grass seed in these areas also. Remove the top layer of dead grass before you start. If you have a large yard, you can use a slit seeder. You put the grass seed in the slit seeder and run it over the soil. As it moves, it drops grass seed. If you do not want to use this tool, you can use a garden fork to break up the soil and plant the seeds yourself. Follow the instructions on the grass seed packet on how best to plant the seeds.
Water the seeds well after they are planted, and make sure the area stays moist until you start seeing grass appear.
How to Fertilize the Lawn
Once you have your yard back to normal, you need to apply a fertilizer to your lawn to keep it looking lush and green. When choosing your fertilizer, the most important nutrients to look for are potassium (K), phosphorous (P), and Nitrogen (N).
If you have a large yard, you can use a rotary or broadcast spreader to apply the fertilizer. The fertilizer is placed in a hopper, and then you roll the spreader over the lawn. To make it easier, apply the fertilizer around the perimeter of your lawn first, and then move the spreader back and forth across the lawn until the fertilizer is evenly spread to the center of the lawn.
If you have a small lawn, you can use a handheld broadcast spreader. Place the fertilizer in the spreader, and as you apply it walk slowly and evenly over the lawn.
No matter which type you choose, the spreader will come with instructions on how to use it properly.
If you need help with any of this, contact a landscape contractor in your area like American Turf & Tree Care.
Share19 April 2016
