April 2017 - Lawn Solutions Australia

Month: April 2017

Driving on grass

Posted on by Anthony
  • Compaction kills lawns – try to design a yard from the start that doesn’t need the lawn to be driven on
  • If you do need to drive on your lawn, consider a paver – or flagstone-type base for your lawn
  • Specialised reinforcement materials are available if you need to park on your lawn

When it comes to driving on lawns the best recommendation is to try and avoid it if at all possible. Understandably there will be times when it can be unavoidable; a backyard shed with minimal access, or extra parking when you’ve got a crowd over. The boat, caravan and box trailer as well will all get to run over the lawn on occasions.

Compaction is one the most critical things when it comes to lawn health and trying to relieve compaction is one of the biggest jobs that commercial and professional greenkeepers deal with on a regular basis. Looking at the design of your yard and the area that needs to be transversed by vehicles is a good place to start and keep in mind that a vehicle parked for any lengthy period will likely kill the grass underneath. Look at some pavers or stone-flagging work; some stepping stone arrangements into the lawn can work well, even bricks or broken pavers in a mosaic-type pattern can look good also – certainly better than bare dirt. Keep in mind any oil leaks or other fuel spills will also spell the end of good-looking-lawn in those areas so paving at the business end is worth considering.

If it’s a temporary solution you’re after, there are a number of new turf-reinforcing-type products on the market, without having to go the stadium reinforcement degree. Most stadiums are built on a hard base, even concrete, with drainage the main consideration. Gravel, geotech-membranes, sand and a special reinforced layer of proprietary brand-name configurations then go over the top before the turf. Netlon, or Strathayr plastic fibres are usually mixed into the top layer that the turf roots grow and bind into and provide a surface that will take a lot of punishment – think monster trucks. These systems can go into the hundreds of dollars per square metre and would be a bit of overkill for most home yard situations but there are a number of alternate products that work on the same type of principle to help prevent compaction. Concrete reinforcement blocks, plastic grating, and newer plastic expanded mesh products available from landscape suppliers all work to some degree, but keep in mind that they are for temporary parking or access.

If you want to look at turf for a permanent parking solution, it’s a sad thing to say, but you’ll probably need to look at some other surface covering other than turf.

Patchy and weedy Lawn – beyond repair or can it be fixed?

Posted on by Anthony
  • In many cases, a patchy and weed-ridden lawn can be bought back to condition with some basic care
  • What lies beneath; is the usual cause of lawn problems with soil compaction issues the main culprit
  • All may not be lost and without a complete replacement a patch-up with some new turf often works

There’s nothing worse than putting work into your lawn, only to be still confronted with bare patches, poor grass-growth and weeds starting to take hold. There are a number of things that can contribute to your lawn looking worse-for-wear, but in most cases it tends to be compaction that is the major cause. You’ll often see it at the local park where the bigger-expansive-lawn-areas are in great condition yet areas around the trees, next to pathways and near the kerb are in a state of disrepair.

The larger open-areas tend to get a bit more love-and-care with larger machinery often used for aerating, fertilising, coring and topdressing, and irrigation in some locations. Kids, pets, backyard parties over summer, they can all take their toll and you might start to see compaction issues or well-worn paths or tracks around your own yard. In any event, we’ll look at trying to repair this issue and it will allow us to reduce one of the factors that may be the cause. Like the park scenario above, it’s some well-placed care that we want to provide and timing is important, especially as we move into the cooler months and our grass growth slows down. We want to encourage lawn growth, treat any weeds and get some air into the soil to help with that growth.

First off, establish the extent of bare patches in your lawn. If it’s over 30% we may want to resign our self to the fact that it’s beyond repair prior to winter and look at either returfing or tackle the job next spring. If it’s a few different areas that need attention or bare patches from traffic, consider getting hold of some solid turf rolls or slabs from your local Lawn Solutions Australia turfgrower or Lawn Solutions Centre. If you know your lawn type is a good thing to match what you have or else grab some photos or a sample and get in touch with one of these places to get hold of the appropriate patch-up turf-type. Find out the turf roll or slab size if you can and then with a hoe or mattock shape out the right size patch pieces in your lawn to a depth of around 40mm or an inch and a half. If you can alleviate any soil compaction in these areas at the same time is a great idea with a garden fork or else digging further down and bringing in fresh turf-underlay. Look at aerating the rest of the lawn surface at the same time and if it’s not too cool yet in your location a light topdress on the newly-installed turf patches will also help in recovery.

Hand-weed any other areas not big enough to patch and after aerating apply a balanced fertiliser mix that will give the lawn a boost prior to winter. Keep your eye on the moisture content of the new patches, you can lift up the turf in the first week or so to see how much you need to wet it through and try and keep it moist – and not slushy. A good spray with the hose every couple of days should be enough to get it on it’s way. Try to avoid herbicides at this time of the year as your lawn will not have the vigour it does in the warmer months to respond. Of cause if it’s a bad weed infestation you may not have any option but now is the transition period between summer to winter weeds so a high mow in most cases will be enough. You mainly want to keep any weeds from seeding so setting the mower higher and just taking the grass-leaf top and seed-head is the key.

A trick professionals use at this time of year is a pre-emergent herbicide / fertiliser blend and the new Oxafert product available through Lawn Solutions Australia Turfgrowers and centres is perfect in this regard. Apart from it being a balanced fertiliser application, the pre-emergent may be the trick to help prevent the onset of any new weeds as it lays down a preventative barrier that will last through the winter months. Lawncare doesn’t need to be difficult and a few simple things can help bring it back from the brink and set you up for a fantastic-looking lawn for next spring. If you’d like help with any lawn-care products or turf replacement contact one of the forty-plus Lawn Solutions Australia Turfgrowers nationwide or one of one hundred-plus Lawn Solutions Australia Centres.

Video – Identifying and Treating Winter Grass

Posted on by Anthony

If you have an invasion of Winter Grass, you’ll definitely want to treat it before it germinates.  If you allow Winter Grass to drop its seeds, next winter it will be back, twice as badly as it was the previous year.  Best plan of attack is to treat it as soon as it appears.  It can be removed very easily by hand as it doesn’t have particularly deep roots and it doesn’t have any runners, growing in simple clumps.  But if you’d prefer to spray, you’ll need to use Winter Grass Killer as a general purpose herbicide wont be effective.  Amgrow Winter Grass Killer is safe to use on buffalo lawns (including Sir Walter DNA Certified), blue & common couches, but should be avoided on Kikuyu Lawns

Genetic Assured Purity, you’re getting what you paid for!

Posted on by Anthony
  • You get what you pay for is as true for turf as it is in most things in life
  • There is a lot of research, plant breeding and Plant Breeders Rights (PBR) behind many grasses
  • Don’t get caught by getting sold something that is ‘just-like’ or ‘bred-from’ the turf you’re after

Turf growing is a specialised cropping farm-operation that in Australia is made up of around 250 growers around the country. Many of these growers produce and supply premium name-brand varieties and some produce commodity type or common grasses. There are around 100 or more different types of turfgrass available to the Australian market with many of these being specialised or sports-turf grass types.

The difficulty in buying turf for both domestic and larger commercial sites in the past has been that there has not been any independent quality standard or organisation to certify that the turf grown is done so to a certain standard. That uncertainty has changed enormously in recent times with the adoption of a new turf accreditation program AusGAP – taken on board by Lawn Solutions Australia growers nationwide. And there’s more to just watching grass grow with AusGAP, says the program’s Australian Compliance Manager Nick Dorney. “Watching grass grow is actually a big part of the AusGAP certification program and we’ve worked with international turf breeders and researchers in some intensive training to help us identify just what we should be looking for in our inspection regimes,” Dorney says of the program. “AusGAP stands for Australian Genetic Assured Purity and that’s exactly what we’re looking for in our AusGAP accredited turfgrowers’ paddocks.” “We’re after consistency of the particular turf crop – we want it to be true-to-type with no evidence of contaminant grass-types and overall any weed infiltration should be minimal. We’re looking for differences in any seed head, colouration, growth rates and general appearance so that we know that what’s growing at each of our farms is an exact replica of the original plant it’s been bred from,” Dorney explains.

Most Australian turf types are warm season clonal grasses and as such are predominantly creeping or stoloniferous grasses, having rhizomes and stolons – the runners that make these grasses so durable and self-repairing. The unique feature of these grass types is that – as the name suggests; being clonal they are identical replicas or clones of the original plant and are propagated vegetatively, where a small section of stolon will reproduce a replica plant. This is the method employed to establish new turf paddocks and in some cases on site where ‘stolonisation’ or ‘sprig planting’ (breaking up the turf and planting in small pieces) is undertaken to establish the new plot. In essence, the parent plant as a section of solid turf is broken up into smaller parts and regrown from these sections as genetic replicas of the original. Genetic testing has been carried out in many cases to corroborate the genetic purity and what can be an expensive test in most cases confirms what AusGAP has helped facilitate in practice.

The AusGAP program works with breeders and turfgrowers to help maintain that the turf-type that is specified or ordered is in fact the original grass-type that was bred and carries that brand. Far too often there can be circumstances where turf-types can be substituted or a cheaper, generic turf variety used for jobs and then fail over time; often due to the lack of specific benefits or traits that are inherent in the originally requested, true-to-type variety. AusGAP claims it is the missing link that helps resolve issues of turf impurity, poor turf quality, or problems associated with non-specified turf, so the customer and end-user ultimately get what they paid for. AusGAP is described as a ‘whole-of-chain’ turf quality assurance program, from early grow-in phase, right through to the delivery of the turf. “From the early breeding stages through to expanding-out the turf-type to what we call ‘foundation farms’, AusGAP is intimately involved. From new paddocks to the grow-in of new plantings and then the turf quality towards harvest time; they are all rigorously inspected on these farms in line with AusGAP quality-protocols before being approved for greater expansion to other member turf farms,” Dorney explains. “Again, on these farms the inspections are quite thorough; before and during grow-out of the new turf-types and then again prior to harvest,” he says. “These farms can only become accredited and certified if their turf growing capabilities are up to standard and a whole raft of other aspects of their operation are beyond reproach.”

AusGAP describes its focus as being firmly on the turf-purity side of things and the whole process of how this comes about; from turfgrowing through to the machinery and equipment, the work health and safety aspect, to the turf quality at harvest and delivery – even in the sales and after-sales of the turf products, AusGAP scores the operation and offers certification only to those that pass the benchmark. “AusGAP certified Turfgrowers, of which there are now around forty from Lawn Solutions Australia that have achieved this standing in Australia, have been through a stringent two-year inspection, reporting and sometimes rectification regime in order to progress to the certification status,” Dorney says. “We want to make sure that these growers are ‘beyond par’ when it comes to the quality of the turf products they offer for sale and ultimately the customer and end-user are specifically getting what they paid for.” AusGAP is currently accepting its next round of applications to join the Lawn Solutions Australia tranche of growers that have successfully completed their first stage certification through the AusGAP program.

Each Lawn Solutions member has been through the extensive process of attaining AusGAP certification meaning that your projects will receive only the best treatment. Lawn Solutions Australia members offer more than just turf. They offer expert knowledge through a team of technical professionals who are always on hand to help clients select the right turf for individual requirements. For more information on AusGAP please visit www.ausgap.com.au  or talk to your local Lawn Solutions Australia member.

Video – Looking after a new instant lawn

Posted on by Anthony

Once your lawn sets root into the soil, it is starting to become established. You can test for this by trying to gently lift a corner of a roll or slab, if it doesn’t lift easily, the roots have set into the soil. This is a good thing as it means your lawn is growing well. Once establishment is happening you can start to back off the watering depending on the weather and the climate in your region.