In recent years, there have been a number of weather-related records broken - both worldwide and in the UK and, as this year includes the hottest UK temperature on record and what looks set to be one of the driest, here are some top tips for looking after your lawn during dry periods:
Remove weeds and other growth
Dry grass needs all the moisture it can get from the soil. Unfortunately, weeds and other living things will compete for what limited moisture there is.
Make sure to remove any weeds from your lawn so that the grass can benefit more from any rainfall or watering that you do.
Aerate your lawn and reduce water “run-off”
During extremely dry periods, the ground can become very hard, making it difficult for water to be absorbed. This can lead to sitting water being evaporated in the heat or running off the surface, away from the lawn.
Aerating your lawn can help the soil to absorb water better (and quicker) by creating holes in the ground for water to spread into. At John Miller Garden Machinery, we offer lawn scarifiers to help, which can be purchased in our online store.
Be smart about watering your lawn
If there is not a hosepipe ban or shortage of water, watering your lawn early in the morning or late in the evening allows the grass to benefit more as more water tends to evaporate during the hotter parts of the day.
Watering your lawn for a short period (of no more than 30 minutes) is also recommended. This avoids the build-up of excess water that can be wasted due to heat evaporation or water run-off.
Regular watering of smaller amounts of water is better than over watering from time to time. Using a sprinkler that spreads the water is also a great way to be more efficient with your water usage.
There are also various lawn treatments available which can be used to add nutrients to your lawn. These can also help your lawn to survive with less watering.
Don’t cut the grass
At John Miller, we often tell our customers to cut their lawn regularly using one of our time-saving high-quality lawnmowers. Unfortunately, we don’t recommend cutting your lawn during extremely dry weather periods when the grass isn’t growing as it normally does.
If parts of your lawn is growing, you may have patches or tufts of grass. In this case, it’s worth trimming those patches down a little bit to help. This can help protect the soil and to keep it moist when the rain eventually arrives.
Once the dry period comes to an end and your grass is growing again, you can start cutting the grass and we recommend staying on top of it so that your grass stays healthy and is able to cope with weeds and moss better.
Initially, it’s best to have the blades at a higher level to allow grass to grow a bit longer. You can then lower the cutting blades once your lawn is looking healthier.
Stay off the lawn
Regularly walking on grass can speed up how quickly it dies. It also increases the number of mud or soil areas where there is no longer grass.
If you have too many of these patches, you may have to use grass seed to repair your lawn.
Try to stay off the grass as much as you can to give your lawn a fighting chance of staying healthy. If you do need to use the lawn to access other parts of your garden then consider taking different routes to allow worn areas to recover.
Lawnmower Servicing
During the dry periods, there’s less activity needed for your lawn, so it might be a good time to have your lawnmower serviced! At John Miller, we provide garden machinery and lawnmower servicing to ensure that your lawnmower is working as it should. Get in touch to book your lawnmower servicing with us.
You can also visit our garden machinery shop in Chippenham, Wiltshire to find out more about our garden machinery including our range of lawn tractors, mowers and scarifiers.