All seasons lawn care

All Seasons Lawn Care Guide: Easy Tips for Year-Round Perfection

Finally, an all seasons lawn care guide to follow in Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall.

Maintaining a lawn for all seasons can be hard work, especially if you don’t have a seasonal lawn care guide to help you. It requires attention, patience, and time to give your greeneries fresh water every so often, mow your lawn to keep your grass healthy, and remove weeds or eliminate pests.

While you can definitely create a routine to check off all the items in your lawn care to-do list, it’s also important that you know how to adjust your efforts and make changes to suit different seasons.

Grass, trees, shrubs, and plants require different kinds of care depending on climate conditions. In this article, we lay down your ultimate lawn care guide for every season so you can keep your lawn healthy and lush all year round.  

Table of Contents

All Seasons Lawn Care: Winter

Winter (December – February) may seem like an uneventful couple of months for your yard. Your lush greeneries will be covered with snow and your plants will go dormant, meaning none of them will grow from December to February.

However, that doesn’t mean you have months to sit back and stop caring for your lawn. Winter maintenance and care are crucial to ensure that your greeneries bloom come spring. During the winter season, conduct the following lawn care efforts.

1. Don’t Skip Weekly Maintenance 

Even if your lawn is mostly dormant during the winter, keep doing your regular maintenance routine. Cut the grass to prevent pests and rodents from finding shelter on your lawn and apply pest control treatments. 

2. Clean Up Your Yard 

Your yard becomes exposed to different debris left by rainstorms, snow, and strong wind. Make sure you get rid of branches, twigs, and leaves every now and then so that they don’t kill your grass. While they don’t look harmful, debris can create bare spots on your lawn, smother your grass, and increase the risk of pests and diseases. 

3. Keep Off the Lawn

The cold climate during winter makes your plants more sensitive. Hence, they can break more easily and weaken much quicker. As much as possible, minimize foot traffic on your lawn to ensure that your plants have enough strength and energy to bloom in the spring. 

All Seasons Lawn Care: Spring

Come Spring (March – May), your yard will be at its prime, with the climate providing the best conditions for plant growth. At this time of the year, you’ll witness your lawn change from a snow-stricken and dull plot of land to a colorful and lush garden. 

To foster their growth and make the most out of the spring season, make sure you conduct the following maintenance efforts.

1. Clean Up the Yard 

Immediately after winter ends, take some time to clean your yard and get rid of debris, such as branches, twigs, and wet leaves. It also won’t hurt to mow your lawn as early as now to give way for new growth during spring. 

2. Remove Weeds 

Because your greeneries will be growing at a rapid pace in the spring, it’s time for you to pay more attention to weed growth. Remove aggressive weeds such as foxtails, crabgrass, dandelions, and thatch before they take hold of your lawn and ruin your grass.

3. Apply Fertilizer and Pest Control 

Aside from fostering new growth in spring, it’s also the best time to take care of any damage that may have happened during winter. The cold climate may have stripped your greeneries of necessary nutrients and your lawn may have housed uninvited pests and rodents. 

In early March, you will need to begin a fertilization schedule to supply your grass, trees, and shrubs with the nutrients they lost during winter. Also, endeavor pest control solutions to get rid of harmful insects that can easily wreak havoc to your lawn. 

4. Test the Soil 

A lot of your lawn care efforts will rely on the type of soil that you have. If your lawn has sandy soil, moisture from the winter can dry quickly but it also means that the soil didn’t hold enough nutrients for your plants to grow. On the other hand, clay soil can carry an adequate supply of nutrients, but the disadvantage is that it may be limiting your greeneries’ water and oxygen supply. 

Conduct a soil test when your lawn has completely dried up. This will help you determine the pH balance of your soil and direct you to the right lawn care and maintenance efforts you need to conduct.

All Seasons Lawn Care: Summer

The subtle sunshine and mild breeze of Spring turn into intense heat in June, which signals the beginning of Summer (June – August). This is the time when your lawn needs more attention than ever, so make sure that these lawn care efforts are part of your list of summer activities. 

1. Mow Your Lawn 

During summer, mowing your lawn should be a weekly endeavor because your grass will be growing at a much faster rate from June to August. However, make sure that you don’t cut them too short to prevent the heat from drying out your soil and burning your grassroots. Cut only ⅓ of your grass blades each week and leave the clippings on the lawn to provide your plants with extra nutrients. 

2. Water Infrequently 

A common mistake that homeowners make is overwatering their lawn during summer. Despite the weather being scalding hot, summer actually calls for more infrequent watering. Ideally, you should only be watering your lawn to six inches in depth. Also, make it a point to set your watering schedule between 6 to 10 in the morning or 4 to 7 in the late afternoon. 

3. Conduct Pest Control 

Pests such as sod webworms, grub worms, aphids, chinch bugs, caterpillars, ants, fleas, and ticks are more active during the summer season, which means that you might be seeing a lot of them in your lawn. Make sure that when you do spot these pests, get rid of them immediately before they eat your grass and compete for nutrients in the soil. 

All Seasons Lawn Care: Fall

Fall (September – November) is the last stop before winter begins all over again. There isn’t a lot of maintenance required during Autumn, but take this time to prepare your lawn for the winter season. 

1. Clean Up Your Yard 

During autumn, a lot of leaves and branches will fall on your yard. Make sure to take them off before they pile up and attract insects or pests. It’s not a good idea to leave your lawn filled with fallen debris up until winter. 

2. Seeding 

Fall is the best time to plant new greeneries thanks to its ideal temperature for seeding or sodding. If you are thinking about adding new plants, grass, or bushes, do it during autumn when the weather is below 70 degrees. 

3. Apply Fertilizer

Fertilize your lawn during fall to ensure that you are supplying the soil with enough nutrients it can store throughout the winter season before the plants go dormant. This should help your plants survive the cold weather and grow more efficiently in the spring.

4. Aeration 

The cold winter season can cause the ground to freeze. To prepare for it, you’ll need to aerate your lawn to avoid soil compaction and help your grass access oxygen, nutrients, and water during winter. Lawn aeration can be as simple as punching small holes in the soil or better yet, engage a professional service to assist you. 

Need More Help?

Need a pro to handle your lawn care year-round? Just contact American Landscapes here for a free, no-obligation estimate. Or call us at (513) 947-8727.

You can also learn more about our lawn care applications and treatments, landscaping, and outdoor lighting services by reading our blog. In addition to fertilizer and weed control, we provide mosquito control, lawn aeration, lawn seeding, and much more.

Tagged