Late Fall Fertilizing with LAWN DEPOT WINTERFEAST TURF FOOD – Late fall brings us ever closer toward the end of the grass growing season, when roots are still active but blade growth has greatly slowed. This is the most important feeding time of the year for grass plants. Roots grow deeper and thicker in the still-warm soil, while blades green up but don’t grow much. Lawns stay green longer into the fall and green up faster in the spring. Lawns that have been damaged by difficult growing conditions this summer and fall will thicken and recover better with a late fall feeding. Lawn Depot WINTERFEAST fertilizer is the most complete fertilizer available at this time of the year. It’s why our lawns, both DIY lawns and Turf Management lawns look better in late fall and early spring, and are thicker and healthier going into next year. Fertilize with WINTERFEAST now and water-in if possible for best results, before the ground freezes solid in mid-late December or beyond.
Late Fall Seeding – By now, all serious seeding/reseeding should have been completed. Although soil temperatures are still well above freezing, they are cooling as the overnight temperatures fall more regularly into the 30s and below, and seed germination becomes more difficult and slower even when the areas seeded are kept moist. The Lawn Depot recommends that the only seeding that should be considered from now on (early-mid November) should be done with our fastest-germinating seed mix, EVERGREEN HYBRID PERENNIAL RYEGRASS BLEND. And any seeding done from now on (as well as seed sown earlier that has not yet fully germinated) should be irrigated regularly (daily). It does not matter whether the new grass is well enough established when winter dormancy sets in to have been mowed. Germinated grass is not adversely affected by cold. So, let your objective in the late fall be to get all the seed germinated. Then roots will continue to develop in the warmer underground, and by next spring the new grass will be ready to burst forth.
Liming Lawns in the Late Fall – Liming acidic soils regularly allows fertilizer nutrients to be more readily absorbed by the growing grass plants. A soil pH of between 6.0 and 6.5 is ideal for the availability the macro-nutrients, as well as the micro-nutrients in most turf fertilizers to the plants. Our fast-acting Enhanced Lime with Titan is applied at 5 lbs./1,000 sq. ft. for maintenance applications or 12 lbs./1,000 sq. ft. to increase pH. It is more effective than dolomitic limestone in raising soil pH. It begins to neutralize soil acidity immediately, resulting in soil pH increases that can be measured in weeks rather than months, thus promoting better root development, vigor and growth, as well as drought and stress tolerance.
Mowing and Leaf Removal – Grass is still growing. And leaves are still falling. You are all encouraged to continue managing both of these actions through the end of November. Because the soil temperature is still warm coupled with any rain we get, lawns will continue to grow nicely. We don’t want leaves to accumulate on lawns, and we don’t want lawns to get ragged from lack of regular mowing, so we’re recommending that lawns still be mowed every 7-10 days until we start getting overnight temperatures that fairly regularly dip below freezing. Only then will lawns really slow in growth rate. Bear in mind that grass won’t completely stop growing until the soil nears the freezing point. At that point, we’d like lawns to be leaf-free and mowed at a height of about 2 ½” – 3”.