Sorting the lawn out

That depends on why it bothers you. To me if it looks green, then fine and even the odd purple flower is OK. What you don't want is Dandelions though, often if somebody up wind of you has loads and lets them seed. Brian

Multiple applications of 'weed and feed'

And mowing

SBK for dandelions

Mosskiller for the Moss

Resolva Lawn weedkiller like:

with moss, its spray across whole lawn and then rake out dead moss 2 weeks after application.

With dandelions, Apply SBk according to instructions, Then nothing will seem to happen for a month then you will wake up to a lawn full of brown dandelions which can then be lifted out and thrown away

With Daisies, spot treat with Resolva Lawn. wait a week. If no sign of browning or curling of leaves, apply again. They will then finally go after a month

As for reseeding I would do this last, at least 2 months after any palst application of chemicals as you are not supposed to use any chemicals on new grass for 6 months.

Also. The Moss areas would probably benefit from improved drainage. Can be as simple as spiking with a garden fork. Consider any vulnerable cable/pipe you may encounter.

Lawn grass varieties can have noticeably different shades of green and leaf coarseness. Best ignored.

What about ants nests? A number on our lawn which manifest as a gentle hump that I take the top off when I mow.

Can I apply the moss killer and Resolva at the same time?

So sounds like I apply the killers first then assume I will need to scarify and then reseed? I have some grass "fertiliser" I bought a few years ago. Should I wait 6 months after the reseed for that?

In message snipped-for-privacy@mid.individual.net>, Tim Streater snipped-for-privacy@streater.me.uk> writes

Our front lawn was previously an Orchard so our Ants are well established:-( Current practice is to use *Ant Stop* a commercially available preparation similar to sugar. The crystals include a bio-active agent.

Any hot sunny day will find me patrolling the grass with a spike in one hand and the Ant stop dispenser in the other. Ants bring their pupae near to the surface for warmth and to pupate. Easily spotted by a small pile of soil granules. Spike hole, teaspoonful of crystals and move on...

My mother would have used a mix of sugar and Borax but this seems out of favour today.

Borax seems to be very difficult to find these days.

Won't help the bare patches. He needs to weed and feed late in autumn then rake out the thatch, which scarifies the soil, and put plenty of grass seed down just before the weather turns rainy but while the soil temperature is still high from the summer. THis allows the newly germinated seed to develop some decent roots over winter.

That certainly worked for me a couple of years ago.

? eBay, less than a tenner for a kilo, delivery included.

you are supposed to NOT mow the lawn for at least 3 days and again for a min of 3 days after applying. You have to apply it as a fine spray as you want to wet ALL of the moss to turn it black. Then rake out after 2 weeks

I would then apply the resolva after you've raked out the moss.

You don't want to overwhelm the lawn with two many different chemicals too close together or you will end up with a single bald patch!

As for ants, you need to target the queen ant. You need a bait that the ants will take back to the nest in order to kill the queen.

If you succeed killing all teh worker ants, the Queen will simply produce more!

That's where I finally found it - it was shipped from the US! I suppose that's why it was so expensive...

Ultimately grass will seed and creep. I weed and feed and its all green, and as I keep on applying I get less weed and more grass

He needs to weed and feed

The best time to weed and feed is right now. when the weeds and the grass are GROWING

Ultimately maybe. I recall under the grass patch under a trampoline being bare for years after it was dismantled.

Best to apply grass seed where the ground is bare.

Can this be right. Spray SBK all over to kill dandelions.I hope it is as we have a bad case of dandelion

Don't try for a bowling green as you will never get there without a full time groundsman!

You will never fully be free of some weeds in a lawn if your neighbours have, say, seeding dandelions growing in theirs.

Possibly the little purple flowers in the grass are a feature to keep. It means that the soil conditions are ideal for them and if they have small leaves they may be a ideal green ground cover.

Don't worry about different shades of green. Some people use a roller on the back of their mower to stripe the lawn so it looks if it has two shades of green. If you live in the USA you can possibly find someone to come around and paint your whole lawn the same shade of green :)

Are the bald patches high traffic areas or under tress/bushes?

Are they high areas where you a scalping the top off with every mowing? If this is the case set your cutting to be higher.

Different grass varieties are more suited for high traffic or "play" areas whereas other varieties are more suited to the being treated with kid gloves. Sometimes a mix is the best compromise.

Consider also introducing small leaf miniature clover into your lawn. It may/will make your lawn look greener when in the summer months your grass turns brown and watering the lawn is too expensive or is banned.

If the whole lawn is really bad dig it up, level out the soil and improve the drainage in the high moss areas, break up compacted soils and re-seed or turf. Without remedial action in the problem areas they will always remain problem areas.

Thanks. The bald patches are where the trampoline is and also where previous there was moss and thatch that was scarified out. The moss areas will try and remediate as you suggest. The soil is decent quality and below that is largely sand a couple a foot or 2 down. How best to do this?

Those areas are shaded by bushes so only gets good sunshine mid morning. Not sure if that makes much of a difference?

thats right, its this stuff:

Apply all over the lawn evenly.

Then nothing will happen for a few weeks... then you will wake up to browned dandelions as the tap root has been soaking up the SBK.

Pick off the dandelions and dispose of in unrecyclable waste rather than into your garden bin or compost heap.....

Also discard the first few weeks of grass mowings the same way....

Then once all gone, if you get the odd one, spot spray treat it with Weedol or Resolva for Lawns.

Yeah, I think shade encourages moss. I hit mine with wed and feed over one whole summer and gradually the grass grew and the moss died. Never bothered to scarify. As far as I am concerned that is merely cosmetic