Gardening: Watering and weeding most important yard tasks right now
It’s July folks. Where has the year gone? Our dry spring has thrown my garden when-to-do-what timeline way off and I’m sure I’m not alone. So, what should we be paying attention to right now.
Watering is the most important task to focus on. Most of us probably had to turn on our irrigation early this year. It was so dry that there wasn’t any time to ramp up the watering schedule and that probably killed some plants. I lost a new $100 Japanese maple by not getting one of my systems going fast enough. Even plant geeks lose expensive plants.
Check out your sprinkler system before it really gets hot. Look for broken or plugged heads. If a zone doesn’t seem to have the pressure it should have, check for pipe leaks. Do this in the early morning or late evening when the water pressure is good. Most conventional plantings and lawns need an inch of water a week while drought tolerant plantings need maybe one-half inch. If you have new plantings of either, be a little more generous with the water.
Water longer and less often. Watering longer each time allows the water to sink deeper into the soil where the roots are. Watering 45 minutes twice a week is better than watering 15 minutes every day. To measure your system output, set out tuna or pet food cans and run your system for 15 minutes and measure how much water was captured. Use that number to measure how long it takes to put down an inch of water in a week.
Another task to take on is weeding. Pulling weeds now will reduce your work later in the summer when it’s hot and will help you catch many weeds before they go to seed. Don’t compost your weeds, especially if they have seeds. Rather put them in the trash or the green bin. Weeds need sunlight to germinate so mulching your beds prevents light from getting to the seeds. Good mulches include clean grass clippings, bark, shredded pine needles and arborist’s wood chips.
There is a lot of debate about whether you should fertilize lawns now. The old rule said to fertilize lawns on the summer holidays; Memorial Day, Fourth of July and Labor Day. New thinking about how the lawn takes up nutrients says to fertilize in late April with a slow-release fertilizer and then not again until early September. A slow-release fertilizer will release nutrients through June. Once we get into the hottest part of the summer, a lawn will go dormant because of the heat and won’t need the fertilizer. Once it starts cooling down in September, the grass rebounds and will start using the fertilizer again. This fall fertilizing is actually the most important one of the year because the grass will go into winter dormancy with nutrients stored in the roots.
Lastly, a dark grass lawn is not a healthy lawn. Using these methods will create a healthy medium green lawn.