Spring lawn care tips

By Don Davis
Published: March 25, 2008

Lawns are in rough condition after the long dry season last year. They have unsightly patches of dead brown grass between clumps of green grass. Many of these patches have been invaded by winter weeds, such as chickweed and bittercress. Any bare spots not filled with weeds at this time will soon be covered with crabgrass or some other kind of summer weed.
You have several options to consider for lawn improvement. None of them is perfect, and each one has potential drawbacks.
Fertilizing is worth thinking about. Some nitrogen applied now will stimulate leafy growth and help cover the areas where grass died last year. Be careful about putting on too much fertilizer, as this may cause your lawn to suffer from devastating outbreaks of brown patch and other diseases once the weather turns hot. Use only a half-dose of fertilizer, if you must fertilize. Also remember that spring fertilization is not a good substitute for fall fertilization.
Bare spots larger than your hand may not fill in on their own as your grass grows. They often need to be replanted with grass seed. This operation is complicated by the weeds in your lawn.

If you plant grass seed in a part of your lawn where crabgrass grew last year, the young grass will be swamped by rampant crabgrass growth. No weed killing product is available to control crabgrass without also killing the seedling fescue, rye or bluegrass.

If you have already applied a crabgrass preventer (or pre-emergence weed killer), you cannot plant grass seed until late summer. This kind of product kills grass seed along with crabgrass seed.

Clumps of chickweed, bittercress and other winter weeds will have to be removed by hand if you plan to plant grass seed now. The weed killers made for controlling these broadleaf weeds are not safe to use less than a month before seeding. They leave behind toxic residues, which are harmful to germinating grass seeds for several weeks.

Another option is to plant grass seed now, and spray with broadleaf weed killer once the young grass is established. When your new grass is old enough to have been mowed twice, it is old enough to be sprayed with weed killer without risk of injury.

When shopping for lawn care supplies you will see various products that combine fertilizer with weed killer. Some of these “weed and feed” products are for crabgrass prevention and others are for broadleaf weeds. Both kinds could be useful now, although the nitrogen they contain is undesirable if your lawn was fertilized adequately last fall.

Delaying your plan to sow grass seed until late August is also an option to consider. You could use weed killers in spring and summer to keep bare spots free of weeds and ready for seeding when the time comes.

The ultimate solution is to renovate your lawn completely. This is done by eliminating all vegetation and planting a new lawn at the end of summer. If you choose this approach to lawn maintenance, all you need to do in spring is keep your grass mowed.