The Perfect Lawn Fertilizer for Green Lawn​

Your yard in suburban Kansas City faces many persistent challenges every year.  In order to get a healthy, lush, and green lawn that your neighbors will envy, constant vigilance is required.  To help you move forward with this path you must pay attention to the following factors.

1. Yard conditions

2. Grass blade length

3. Fertilizer/pest control

4. Water

For the last 20 years, Taussig has been helping you with all these factors, except of course the actual watering of the lawn.

Yard Conditions

In order to have a strong, thriving, and lush lawn, the conditions of the lawn play a major role.  The physical layout of the yard can contribute to the result of your lawn.  If your lawn has excessive tree or leaf coverage, some branches should be trimmed in order to allow at least partial sun for proper growth and minimized fungus growth.  The grading of your lawn is also important.  The yard needs to have proper drainage so that water does not puddle or sit for prolonged periods of time.  For home protection, you should also have the yard sloping away from any structures.  

The final contribution to yard conditions are items that are easily within your control but often overlooked in a quest for a green lush lawn.  Yards should be aerated yearly.  Aeration is good for a lawn that needs help, it is good for a healthy lawn.  Aeration allows for oxygen and nutrients to better reach the roots of your lawn.  If you are just starting down this path to a lush lawn, verticutting and overseeding are the perfect first steps to clean the slate on your yard.  These yard renovations should be done in the late summer and early fall to give the new grass a chance to take root.  Planting grass seed in spring is not recommended.  When planted in the spring, the grass will not have the proper root structure required to survive our hot and dry midwestern summers.

Grass Blade Length

For your lawn to thrive, it must be maintained at the proper length.  So often we focus on time savings and will make the mistake of cutting a lawn too short (to go longer between mows).  Or we will not spend the time to sharpen the mowing blades and hack versus cutting the lawn.  The proper height for healthy fescue lawns in the Johnson County area is 3.75-4” tall.  This height is short enough to not appear unruly, while allowing the grass to better cover the ground and minimize drying out the soil, then burning the lawn.  Another key to remember is that it is unhealthy to cut more than 1/3 of the grass blade length per pass.  Weekly Mowing more often is the best path to a healthy lawn.

Blade sharpness is critical to not just the appearance of a lawn, but also its health.  Dull blades will hack or tear the grass blades.  These broken blades will allow for disease and poor growth patterns.  Poorly cut grass will also discolor, bringing brown to the top surface which is another enemy of a green lawn.  We sharpen our blades weekly to maintain your lawn’s sharp-cut edges and health.

Improper mowing techniques can also undo any of the other hard work that has been done to the lawn.  By poor edging the prodiamine layer can be broken, allowing the grassy weeds to take hold in your lawn.  Once the weeds start on an edge, they can use the heat from the driveway or sidewalk to grow, slowly taking over your lawn.  Keep a clean consistent edge on the lawn without cutting into the lawn.

Fertilizer / Pest Control

At Taussig, our 20+ years of experience have led us to our 7-step program for homeowners and businesses alike.  Each step is vital to the long-term success of your lawn. We have adjusted our process after the dramatic drought year we had in 2022.  We have added an additional grassy weed compliment to our Step 2 to have two total chemistries fighting the grassy weeds that are just trying to take over your lawn at any opportunity.

• Step1: Fertilizer with Prodiamine – This includes a spring starter fertilizer to bring the lawn out from its winter slumber and a pre-emergent for stopping grassy weeks like crabgrass

• Step 2: Weed and Feed – This is a quick fertilizer with weed control for both broad leaf (clover and dandelions) and additional different chemistry used to control grassy weeds

• Steps 3 and 4 – This is the grub control phase to stop the grass root-eating bugs, it is also a summer preparation fertilizer slow release to ensure that the yard is not burnt out

• Step 5: General Insecticide – This is to kill most nuisance-type bugs including mosquitos etc.  No fertilizer in this step to ensure the lawn is not overstimulated 

• Step 6: Late Season Broadleaf – This is a summer recovery blend, slow-release nitrogen for bringing the lawn nourishment without forcing rapid growth, in addition, we have additional broadleaf weed control to kill off any weeds that have taken hold during the hot and dry summer months

• Step 7: Winterizer – This is to prepare the grass for winter dormancy, a slow-release nitrogen to strengthen the roots so that there is a strong base to build on the following spring

When these steps are followed a constant gradual improvement will occur.  Basically, these steps are to feed and grow the turf quality so that any pests cannot get a foothold.  Any pests that do, can be quickly removed.

Watering

Your grass needs water in order to grow.  It does not matter how much fertilizer you may throw at it, without the proper amount of water, it will wither and die.  How much water depends upon multiple factors; time of year, drainage, water table level, and the amount of shade/sun coverage.  Overwatering can be just as dangerous as underwatering, allowing the fungus to take over sections of 

your lawn.  As a rule of thumb, you should water your grass until the soil feels wet to a depth of four to six inches. Use your fingers to check for proper saturation.  Of course, the lawn does not care if that comes from your sprinkler or rain.  To minimize fungus or loss to evaporation, it is recommended to water in the morning.

By controlling the factors long term, your lawn can be the envy of the neighborhood.  Give us a call at Taussig to help you in every step of the path toward a greener, healthier lawn.