Pleasant Landscapes

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Phone 843.886.9316     Fax 843.886.4918 Click Here to Contact or Email Pleasant Landscapes

Phone 843.886.9316 | Fax 843.886.4918 | Email Us | Isle of Palms, SC

Pleasant Landscapes Newsletter - March 2009

To properly maintain southern grasses in the Charleston area weed and feed is not the cure all for nice lawns.  A lot of factors need to go into timing and treatments of chemicals and pesticides for the lawn throughout the year.  Weed and feed is not the magic dust to solve all problems.  Timing it the most critical element in any type of turf application.  Our company often starts in February with a light pre-emergent application.  This is the time we often use our herbicides to clean up clover or any other broad leaf weeds because the temperatures allow the turf to go undamaged.  We choose to use a split application method for pre-emergent due to sandy soils and their tendency to leach in our area.  This also gets a pre-emergent down prior to the germination of our early spring weeds therefore reducing the need for herbicides on weeds in the future.  In March, it is our policy to place a light fertilization and insecticide treatment to reduce over wintering mole crickets and grubs.  The reason for light fertilization is because until the ground temperature rises, it makes it impossible for the plant to take up a heavy fertilization until the spring.  Also an untimely freeze can damage rapidly growing turf.  Applying a full fertilization in March wastes many nutrients because of the lower temperatures.  The nutrients leach out of the sandy soils before the temperatures get high enough for the plant to adequately absorb them.  For this reason, our main fertilizer application is postponed until the warmer month of April.  In April we apply fertilizer for the lawn and shrubs as well as a light pre-emergent at this time.  One can see that for proper turf maintenance one treatment does not achieve a quality lawn, which is the down fall of the weed and feed solution.  Our company uses specifically targeted treatments along with the right timing to achieve a quality lawn.  If you weed and feed too early the nutrients are lost because of the colder ground temperatures, but by performing the process too late, turf damage may result.  If one does choose to weed and feed, one must read the label carefully for correct temperature application.  Also not all weed and feed is specific to all types of grass in the Charleston area.

Spring is also the time for brown patch to reappear after the winter.  Brown patch may lie dormant over the winter and resurface once temperatures begin to rise in the spring.  Look for circles of yellow grass especially yellow around the edges to diagnose brown patch in the grass.  If one does see the yellow circles a fungicide is necessary.  For more information on brown patch please refer to out website www.pleasantlandscapes.com, or feel free to contact us at any of our locations by phone.

P.O. Box 445 - Isle of Palms, South Carolina 29451 - Phone 843.886.9316 | Fax 843.886.4918

Johns Island: 843.768.6808 | East Cooper: 843.886.9314
Daniel Island: 843.216.4796 | Summerville: 843.851.8008

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