You’ve raked the last of the leaves from your lawn. Now you can kick back until spring before you have to start taking care of your turf again, right? Not so fast. Winter-related events like snow pileup, de-icing salt, and fallen limbs can damage your turf, causing compaction, brown and bare spots, and more. It’s important that you keep your Western North Carolina turf protected with regular care and cleanup throughout winter.

Winter Lawn Prep

If you haven’t already prepped your lawn for the cold, it’s not too late to do it now.

1. Remove all lawn furniture, clean it, and store it in a dry place. This will not only protect the furniture from the elements, but it will also help prevent your lawn from becoming compacted.

2. Aerate and fertilize. Aerating will loosen the soil, helping water and nutrients to get down into the root system. Our Western North Carolina soil tends to be more acidic, so fertilize with lime for best results.

3. Spread a cool weather grass seed, such as fescue.

Winter Lawn Maintenance

Now that you’ve prepped the lawn, you can perform maintenance throughout the winter.

1. Keep your lawn free of debris and fallen limbs. Check regularly after heavy winds or snowstorms. Limbs and debris left on your lawn will cause compaction of the soil and can prevent good drainage.

2. Don’t pile snow on your lawn when you shovel. Keep snow piles at the edge of the road. Particularly be aware of shoveling snow that’s close to roadways into piles on your lawn. Roadway snow can contain runoff from cars and snow clearing vehicles, which can damage grass. If you do have roadway snow melt into your lawn, water it as soon as possible to flush out the salt and other toxins.

3. Likewise, avoid allowing any de-icing products that you scatter onto walkways get onto your lawn. These materials often contain salt and can be harmful. Try to choose environmentally-friendly products when possible.

4. If there’s a winter drought, you might have to water your lawn! Your grass can dry out even in winter, so give it a good drink during dry spells — but do so only on days when temps are over 40 degrees.

5. Finally (and we know you’ll love hearing this), you might even have to keep weeding during winter. Here in Western North Carolina, temperatures can warm up enough that you might see weeds sprouting here and there. Get rid of them now, so you won’t have an even bigger job to deal with in spring.

 

Let us make sure your lawn is healthy all winter long. Give us a call, and we’ll do all the work while you sit by the fire and enjoy a hot cocoa! We have a variety of lawn maintenance programs to suit your needs.