A New Year's Resolution You Can Keep... For Your Yard

New Year's is always great for a fresh start. So while you make pledges to exercise more, eat better, perhaps even attend church more regularly, don't just think about fresh starts for yourself. Remember last summer when you let your lawn go brown in May? Remember, when it became an eyesore in the neighborhood compared to everyone else's green grass. Yeah... it might be nice to not let that happen again - nothing quite dampers a home's appearance like an ugly lawn.

While getting that nice lawn back is a bit of work, it's achievable. So start planning now so your grass is green and healthy come spring. Here's some tips:

• Aerate: Did you water your lawn only to find that it still died out in the summer heat? Get it aerated in the spring. Aerating essentially consists of using a machine to poke small circular holes in your lawn. In turn, this allows more oxygen, water and nutrients to get to your grass roots, which means less watering and more growth. You can call us here at EMI, Garden Escapes or another professional to perform these services or rent a machine and do it yourself. It also helps break up thatch.


• Get on a fertilization plan: It's recommended that you fertilize your lawn four to five times a year. Make your schedule around the holidays. Lay down your first spread in early spring and then fertilize around Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day and a final fertilization prior to winter. This helps your lawn grow and stay healthy year-round.


• Water responsibly: It's always best to water during the early morning and early evening hours. This is the period where the wind is typically lightest, meaning that the sprinklers find more of your lawn and water isn't blown about by the wind elsewhere. It's also the time of day when the sun isn't hot, meaning that water is able to soak into your lawn and not dry up as fast. Also be sure to be mindful of the weather forecast as nothing has quite the effect on a lawn like rainwater - and all the nutrients in it - so turn off your sprinklers when rain is predicted to save on your water bill. You can also buy a rain sensor for this purpose.


• Smart planting: Give your lawn and landscaping a bang every spring by planting tulip bulbs this fall. The bulbs will give way to beautiful tulips to help you ring in spring and nice weather every year after they're planted.


• Smart mowing: As you're mowing your lawn, be sure not to cut too short - this can stunt growth. For this reason, it's advised that you cut on high settings so you're never taking more than one-third of a blade of grass off. It's also advised that you mow in different patterns each times. This ensures that your lawn doesn't grow a particular way and prevents wear patterns.

Have a great New Year from all of us here at Environmental Management, Inc!

Fall is a Great Time for Renovating Lawns

Break Time For Your Lawn

With many areas experiencing drought this year, the lawns are all looking a little forlorn. As a homeowner, you have done what you could, but it doesn't seem to be enough. With fall coming, there is a small reprieve to help to renovate that tired, thirsty lawn.

• As the weather cools and turns to autumn, more rain may be on the way as we head to winter. As long as it rains where you live and there are no government declarations of drought or the need to conserve water, you really don't have to water the lawn in the morning and/or evening to keep it green until the first frost. When a frost advisory is announced on the nightly news, stop watering.


• Aerating the lawn seems like a spring thing, and although aerating can wake up a lawn in spring, doing it in the fall as well gives it time to breathe and make room for new blades of grass in the spring.


• After aerating, weed and feed and additional seeding where needed can take place. The lawn is ready to except the extra nutrients, herbicides and seeds that will remain partially dormant during the winter but will spring anew in, well, spring.


• Look for weed and feed combos with a good amount of nitrogen and moss killers, if you happen to have moss springing up in and around your foundation. Moss likes to grow in cool, shady moist areas, and the sides of your home that don't receive a lot of sunlight but collect a lot of rain or sprinkler water is where you will find patches of it.


• A helpful mnemonic for the most basic lawn care duty is, "Don't stop mowing until the grass stops growing!". Some warm Indian summer days in mid to late autumn can confuse the lawn and keep it growing, and provide the perfect Petri dish for disease if it's not mowed. If you mulch, have a really solid idea where that mulch should go to avoid the same issues.

Your lawn requires seasonal changes in care and maintenance. A lawn is not a naturally occurring thing in nature and requires your attention in every season but winter for obvious reasons. Mid autumn and early spring are the best times to provide a renewing to your lawn. Knowing what you can do and when and how to do it makes all the difference, even if you are in a drought area. While caring for your lawn in each season isn't common knowledge and has to be learned over time, as a homeowner who cares you will be able to achieve stunning results with basic lawn care which includes mowing, aerating, seeding, weeding, and feeding. If your problems have more to do with lumps and bumps and thatch, either learning for yourself how to treat these issues or asking questions of lawn care professionals, like the Garden Escapes staff, will point you in the right direction.

6 Tips To Get Your Lawn Ready For Autumn

It is that time of year again, when the leaves begin to fall and the neighborhood looks like a cornucopia of colors. This is also the time when the lawn begins to turn beige and lose the luster it took all year to achieve. There are ways to save a lawn and keep it green for at least a few more months before winter sets in.

1. The first, and most often overlooked, way to keep a lawn looking great is to rake up any leaves that fall. A few leaves decorating the yard aren't likely to cause a great deal of mischief, but a blanket of leaves spanning the yard will cause major problems. The grass is essentially being smothered since it will be left in the dark and blanketed against direct rainfall. Keeping the yard clear of falling leaves will allow the lawn to thrive without any worry.

2. Ensuring the lawn gets the proper nutrients is another way to help it through the autumn months. There are a variety of fertilizers that can help the lawn stay strong against any challenges. Many of these fertilizers will contain nitrogen, which is a key part in any healthy lawn. Many of these fertilizers will also contain a moss killer to clear out any pesky moss that may have set in due to moisture.

3. Just because cooler temperatures have set in doesn't mean that a lawn's water needs can be forgotten. A lawn is still very much alive in the autumn months and still needs to be taken care of the same way it was in the summer. The only time a lawn does not need to be watered is when the temperature is approaching freezing or there has been substantial rain fall.

4. Using herbicides is another way to prevent a damaged lawn. Weeds can still form in the cooler months and stopping them before they have time to take root is the best way to prevent infestation in the spring. There are a large variety of great herbicides on the market that treat all kinds of damaging weeds.

5. It may be tempting to take a break, but mowing the lawn throughout autumn is still very important. Until the grass stops growing, it needs to be maintained so that excess growth doesn't make the perfect breeding ground for disease. These lawn killing diseases can have severely negative impact on a lawn and create excess work that could otherwise be avoided.

6. Make sure to repair any dead areas of the lawn. If these patches are ignored it will only make more work for the spring months and leave an uneven appearance across the lawn. These can be treated by spreading grass seed across the bare area and ensuring it receives additional water and fertilizer to ensure growth.

Many people don't realize that autumn is the best time to make preparations and determine the lushness of a lawn when spring arrives. Taking proper steps to care for a lawn in autumn will be a main factor in how well a lawn does for most of the next year. Most of these steps are easy to complete and require no more work than what a person does during the summer months. The work pays off when a properly prepared lawn becomes the envy of the neighborhood the following year