Low maintenance yard
I spend a lot of time on my lawn, but I don’t do much to it. Someone else mows and edges it, every other week. I pull weeds. As much as I hate chemicals, I had to spray this spring! I couldn’t keep up with the weeds and there were 4 different types that tried to poke or sting me. I found them the hard way, barefoot! I applied Weed Beater for Southern Lawns and added Turbo. The Weed Beater was not quick acting, but it was thorough. A few things didn’t die, like some of the Dichondra. I pull or ignore anything that doesn’t bite me. I only water my lawn and sometime take help from professional landscapers when it starts to wilt. In the shady front yard, I watered 3 times last year. The western half, was watered twice, so far this year. Where my veggie garden is in the back, I have watered much more often. The other half of the back, hasn’t been watered at all. The front yard has been fed once (that’s not once a year) in 25 years…about 3 years ago, only because we had a bunch of broken bags of Houactinite (organic) at the store. It’s the thickest, greenest, most lush lawn in my neighborhood.
“The Spot” (insert dramatic music)
With everything that is right and easy with my lawn, there has been this spot that has driven me crazy over the years. In the middle of my thick, green lawn is a coffin sized spot. I suggested to my 18-year-old daughter that it might be Jimmy Hoffa’s final resting spot. This lead to a history lesson…sigh. It’s green(ish), but it’s thin and does not grow. It’s not just a small difference in height either, unless you call 2 to 3 inches small. It looks like a dip in the lawn, but it’s not. The rest of the lawn grows like crazy, but this spot could stay unmowed for months, and you couldn’t tell. I have driven a rod into it in several spots, 18 inched deep and dug down over a foot, to see if there was anything under it. I have watered just “the spot” extra, added compost, added topsoil, poked holes with a pitch fork, …nothing changed. Even when I fed the lawn 3 years ago, it greened up, but didn’t grow. I’m in the less is better camp of lawn care and I doubted the neighbors were talking smack about my lawn, so I just sort of accepted it and went on.
Then, it happened…
Have you ever had one of those “I’ll fix you!” moments? Sometimes we get good results, other times you might end up on the side of the road, picking up trash (put on a big hat and sunglasses, you shouldn’t be recognized)…all revenge has its rewards. Three weeks ago, I had one of “those” moments. It all started while I was walking up and down the yard, looking for my nemesis, Lespedeza striata. Learn about my weed from hell: https://rcwnurseries.com/?p=89 When I came to “the spot”, I growled at it, sometimes a threat works. I continued to the edge of the yard, searching for my enemy, then headed back across the yard, a few feet over. There was “the spot” again, mocking me. I stopped and stared at it for a minute, the gears in my head, grinding away. That’s when I had “the idea”. I went to my shed and grabbed a bottle of Medina Molasses. I took it to the spot, opened the bottle and poured it, undiluted, in a straight line, from one end to the other. Mess with me, I think not! I decided to wash it off the leaves and grabbed the hose, giving it a quick rinse, put the hose up and went inside.
Drum Roll…..
Below is what it looked like, two weeks later. It really started to put on some height. It’s hard to tell from the picture, but in one area, it grew about 6 inches. Remember, I haven’t watered this side of my yard yet, but it has rained a couple of times. Only time will tell if molasses was the magic bullet, but for now, it’s an interesting grave marker.
