Watering and Mowing

Best practices for a beautiful lawn and landscape

Simply green provides the best lawn service at any price. In order to make sure your property looks its best, you will need to handle the very important tasks of mowing and watering. Please read on to learn how best to handle these tasks.

Mowing

Proper mowing is the single most important thing you can do to ensure your lawn looks its best. Below is a table showing the heights that are recommended for mowing each type of grass. As a general rule of thumb it is best to raise these heights during hot and or dry periods. Also, if you have gone without mowing for more than a week, it is generally advisable to raise you mowing height by one level, mow the lawn, then remow it several days later at the normal height. Finally, if you notice your lawn loses color or looks damaged when mowed you probably either need to mow higher or more frequently.

Some grasses, like Bermuda grass, will also benefit from a process called sanding or topdressing. This is where sand is spread over the lawn to even out low spots and can prevent spot scalping of the lawn.

In addition to proper mowing height, mowing frequency is very important. A general rule is to remove no more than 1/3rd of the height during a single mowing. For example: If your grass is usually mowed at two inches, you should not allow it to grow higher than 3 inches before mowing. Mowing more than 1/3rd will usually stun the grass and may cause browning. Most lawns will be ok with weekly mowing. During periods of heavy rainfall it may be necessary to mow twice weekly to maintain best results. Mowing less often than weekly will generally result in unsatisfactory color, especially on Bermuda grass.

Last but not least, you should keep the blade(s) on your mower sharpened. A sharp blade cuts clean while a dull blade shreds the leaf causing dehydration and introducing the potential for disease. Its really no different than a surgeon using a sharp knife rather than a dull one. You should sharpen your blade at the beginning of the season and at least once during the season. Just to add emphasis to how important this is, the best lawn mowing services sharpen their mower blades daily!

Watering

Water is the life blood of your lawn. Without proper irrigation, your lawn may brown, go dormant or even die out in periods of extreme drought. Even people with irrigation systems may find that their watering practices are doing more harm than good.

A general rule is to provide at least one to two inches of water per week. Guidelines like this are difficult to follow without calculating the rate of water application for each sprinkler zone. If you do not want to follow this guideline than water for at least one hour per zone per week. Frequent, shallow watering is much less beneficial than deeper, less frequent watering. For example, it is better to water twice weekly for 35 minutes, than to water every day for 10 minutes. Please contact us if you need more information about watering.

Simlpy Green is a member of