12 Early Spring Lawn Care Tips – Complete to-do List

The spring season is the harbinger of beautiful lawns and lush gardens. Its arrival marks the growth of exquisite green grass, blooming flowers, and pleasant weather. We all want to have the most beautiful lawn in the neighborhood. Getting a smooth, beautiful, attractive, charming, and lush garden is not a difficult but time-consuming and attention-devoting task.

In this article, we will discuss a complete to-do list about caring for your lawn in the early spring season. By acting on our list, you will be able to develop a fantastic lawn, and everyone would love the outlook and smoothness of the grass in your lawn. We have done considerable research on this topic, and a research paper and an article published by  Dr. Peter Landschoot, Professor of Turfgrass Science also supports our facts.

Let’s give some love to your lawn this spring season!

Early Spring Lawn Care Tips: Complete to-do List

Cleaning the Lawn

The most important and first step is to clean the lawn. Look out for leaves, debris, twigs, and dead grass accumulated over the winter season. You can do this with a rake, blowing the debris is more fruitful than raking as it ensures that tiniest of dead roots and twigs are thrown away. The reason behind removing debris and other waste is to ensure a proper smooth mowing finish of your grass. It also allows fertilizers to reach all the spots in your lawn and helps in watering as well. Dead grass can also cause fungus to develop and stops new grass germination. The layer of dead grass also acts as a breeding ground for pests and insects.

Quick tip: Chipper shredders and leaf mulchers are great to help you dispose of debris and leaves.

Dealing with Snow Molds

If you live in an area where you have to face snow accumulation in your lawn in the winter season, then it is likely that you will see snow molds in your garden. You can get rid of snow mild by raking it. Most of the time, neighboring grass will do the work for you by covering it up. If snow molds last for a longer time, you can pull out the grass and re grass the area.

Soil Assessment

Winter season can impact the pH of your soil. Soil assessment is vital to make sure that you provide an optimum pH for the grass to grow. Most of the varieties grow in neutral pH of around 7. However, some special and unique grass species need a particular pH for growth. You can test the soil with a soil testing kit, which can be brought either online or at a gardening store nearby.

Re-grass Bare Spots

If you notice any bare spots in your lawn, it is time to plant some grass there. You can use a fertilizer for active growth, make sure you put in some good quality soil and match its pH with the rest of the soil in your garden. Water this patch and do not cut the grass until it is 2-inches long. The grass planted in the spring season needs a lot of care in hot weather. You will have to provide it with a lot of water, cut the weeds and keep a lookout for its wellbeing.

Feeding the Lawn

At the onset of the spring season, your lawn requires nutrition. You need to give them a high-quality fertilizer that provides grass with diet. Adding a weed killer is also recommended to thwart the growth of weeds and crabgrass. It is better to stop crabgrass from growing at the starting of the spring season, or otherwise, it will destroy your lawn the entire season. Remember the date when you have fertilized the lawn, do it again after 6-8 weeks with a weed killer. If you notice herbs in your garden, it is recommended to use herbicides. Similarly, insecticides can also be used to kill insects in the lawn.

Weed Management

Managing the already grown weeds is very important as well. Take your shovel, wear your gloves, and cut out all the weeds that are eating the diet of your grass. You can use a pre-emergent weed killer for the early treatment of weeds because you should nip the evil in the bud.

Aeration

Another important to-do thing for caring for your lawn in the spring season is aeration. Aeration is the process of digging out spaces in high-density grass areas. These patches stop the inflow of air and nutrients to the soil, and the soil beneath gets lifeless. If you have such spots in your lawn, the fertilizers won’t reach the soil and will not do any good to it. You can buy aeration tools online or from a nearby gardening shop.  Some gardening experts may recommend using a big mechanical tool. We suggest that you buy a manual tool, save some money and spend it on other items used for caring for your lawn like fertilizers and weed killers.

Equipment Assessment

It is always better to check all your garden equipment before the spring season. You should check your lawnmower, shovels, aeration tools, and other accessories. You must change your mower’s oil filter, check the air filter, spark plug and do a general cleanup of your mower. Check the cutting blade and assess its working and sharp it up. Checking your mower is critical, as you are going to need it frequently over the spring season.

Mowing Routine

Mowing in the spring season is very important. As the grass grows very quickly, it needs to be cut accordingly. Do not mow your grass every 8-10 days in the spring season. Try cutting it on every 5th day in the first couple of months of the spring season. This will ensure that you get greener and thicker grass, mowing every 5th day also ensures that you get an evenly-spread thicker lawn.

Watering Routine

Ether you use a water sprinkler or do manual watering, you should water your garden around 1-1.5 inches. Make sure you water lawn around 10-am in the morning. The frequency of watering your lawn will depend on the weather condition in your area.

Do Mulching

After you are done caring for your lawn, edge out the beds, trim down the dead branches and leaves and replace the mulch. You can use any good quality mulch available from gardening stores. You should add a 2-3 inches layer of mulch around your plants.

Managing Trees

If you have trees on your lawn, it is better to take care of them at the start of the spring season as well. If you can climb the trees and cut off dead or about-to-fall branches, well and good. If not, then you can hire the services of professionals to get rid of them and shape up your trees.

Final Thought