Has winter weather taken a toll on your lawn? Thinned out, diseased turf, and even dead patches commonly occur even on otherwise good lawns when winter’s poor growing conditions take their toll.
We can renovate your winter damaged lawn
Generally we can easily repair whatever damage has been done. In fact we have services that have been specifically designed for this purpose.
- Aerate to help dry out the soil and promote fertilizer and water intake
- Thatch lightly to comb out dead grasses
- Seed and mulch to
- Provide new and improved grass varieties
- Increase the number of plants per unit of area
- Replace grass plants that may have died over the winter
Seed generally will not thrive where there is too much shade or where the soil has become too compacted. Also, we can’t easily tell when soil has become compacted.
Why did the damage occur in the first place?
The answer to this question is complex and even a bit academic. Here’s a brief overview.
Think individual plants instead lawn
When we look at a lawn we see it as a whole. However, a lawn actually consists of thousands of individual grass plants. For the lawn to look perfect most of the grass plants must thrive. When grass plants struggle to survive, they don’t look good. If many of the plants look bad, the whole lawn may look bad—or more typically there are bad patches. Now why is that?
Turf microclimates
We can’t see the variations that occur to the immediate habitat where one particular grass plant lives. What happens there matter. Here are a few possibilities. Keep in mind that many of these occur throughout the year and not just in the winter.
Shade hinders the growth of grass since grass needs sunshine for photosynthesis. Low light levels during winter months can kill grass plants.
Soil compaction greatly hinders root growth and thus hurts turf vigor. Affected areas look poorly all year long.
Poorly drained areas will damage or kill plants during periods with lots of rain—think winter months.
Soil structure matters more than we may realize. Soil consists of sand, silt, and clay in varying proportions. Only rarely do we find the ideal loamy soil in a landscape. Varying amounts of organic matter will also be present. The composition of your soil will almost
certainly vary in different areas of the landscape. Realistically nothing can be done to totally resolve this situation.
Air circulation may affect turf health especially during times of high humidity.
Tree roots compete with the roots of grass plants. Generally the grass wins but still there is a conflict of interest going on.
Fertility always affects turf health and vigor. Too much can be worse than too little. In the Portland area lawns grow and use nutrients all year long except during frozen periods.
Going for the kill
Let’s now keep in mind that one solitary grass plant lives in a milieu of the above factors that influence its microclimate. So what can go wrong
- Too much water hurts and can even kill grass plants
- Fungus diseases may damage the lawn, especially in areas with little air circulation.
- Inadequate light keeps grass plants from growing and recovering.
- Extended periods of freezing weather take a toll on the grass plants.
- Turf grass variety matters as well. Any given cultivar may have more resistance than another to this or that condition.
Add it all up. Problems during winter months can scarcely be avoided.
We offer proactive solutions
Fertility
Maintain an adequate fertilizer program on the lawn throughout the year. We have fertility programs designed for your type of grass.
Aerate the lawn
Lawn aeration improves root growth. People commonly think of aerating the lawn before the summer watering season. However, fall aeration helps root growth over the winter. We offer lawn aeration pretty much anytime soil conditions allow it.
Water & mow
Maintain turf health and vigor during the growing season by watering adequately and mowing frequently. A healthy lawn going into the winter has better chances for coming out into spring in better condition. We offer this service in the greater Portland metro area going into Lake Oswego and surrounding communities.
Proper installation
If the lawn was installed correctly the affect of many of the aforementioned problem issues becomes greatly diminished. A new lawn installation could be the most helpful solution in the end. However, it must be installed correctly so as to solve underlying issues.
Since 1979, we’ve been providing landscape services to the Portland, Oregon metro region. We can customize any of our landscape services to meet your needs.