Click below to listen to my 2 min. Garden Bite radio show: Fertilizing your lawn – why wait?
This is a yearly ponderable by the lawn faithful. Fertilizing the lawn, should you or shouldn’t you? The most correct answer, according to research, is NOT now.
I know, I can hear many of you gasping, but the BEST times to fertilize your lawn are late summer and fall. This is contrary to the traditional springtime application.
Early spring applications of nitrogen cause a surge of top growth in the plants, which makes the lawn look nice in the spring but depletes the plants’ energy reserves. Consequently, when summer stress periods occur, plants are weaker and less able to survive.
Applying fertilizer in late August or early September will provide the plant with adequate nutrition to overcome any summer stresses. In addition, an application of fertilizer in late October or early November, when top growth is minimal but when soil temperatures are still warm enough for nitrogen absorption, plants resume growth and green-up early the following spring without the excessive shoot growth associated with early spring nitrogen applications.
And here’s the other thing, when using herbicides, try not to buy ones that have fertilizer in them.
When fertilizing lawns:
- particularly with quick-release nutrients, it is important to consider the weather and turfgrass conditions to achieve maximum effectiveness.
- Ideal conditions include a cool day with a good rainfall or watering immediately following the fertilizer application to wash the fertilizer off the leaves and into the soil.
Here is more comprehensive information and a lawn calendar from the University of MN Extension on lawn fertilizing.
