Blade stunner

WITH a bit of effort at this time of year, you can transform your humble lawn into a lush green canvas on which you’ll be able to paint beautiful borders.

Start by giving your grass a health check – worn out family lawns will need to build up their strength to cope with the cold weather ahead.

Moss is a sign something is wrong. That can be anything from poor drainage, shade or starved grass to mowing too close, so be ready to resolve the underlying problem and not just treat it with chemicals.

Treating small areas of lawn moss can be done with an autumn feed-andweed with moss killer formulation, any time from now until mid-november.

After a couple of weeks you’ll be able to rake out the dead moss and re-seed to earn yourself a healthy thick sward of grass.

When it comes to perennial weeds, use an old dinner fork to dig out the odd dandelion and daisy. Then, when you’ve raked out the dead grass, you can sprinkle grass seed over the area to repair the patch.

Raking is an important autumn task. But it can be time- consuming, relentless, hard work – so try to focus your mind on the benefits it will bring to your waistline come Christmas…

At the first major leaf-fall, use a metal spring-tine rake for the job.

Scratch

QAt the same time as raking up leaves and debris, you’ll be scarifying too – scratching the soil surface to remove old grass clippings and dead moss that built up during the mowing season.

If left, this “thatch” would suffocate the growing tip, which is found at the base of a blade of grass.

So by deep raking you will allow air to get to the grass roots, which will improve your lawn’s ability to absorb water and nutrients.

When the next lot of leaves fall, which they inevitably will, you can use a kinder leaf rake with plastic or rubber tines to clear them away, or maybe an electric garden vacuum.

If left, the leaves will block out light and cause the lawn to become yellow and prone to disease.

Good drainage is essential for a healthy lawn. A well-used lawn might be growing in compacted soil that, come the winter rains, has muddy puddles on its surface.

It is usually relatively simple to fix – use a garden fork to spike the lawn, making small, deep holes that allow surface water to drain away and improve air circulation to the roots.

Finally, you should feed the grass to add back the nutrients you have effectively taken away with mowing.

Use a lawn fertilizer that contains higher levels of phosphates and potash rather than leaf- making nitrogen. These will help winterise and strengthen the grass, helping it to stand up to the ravages of the frosts to come.