November 2021 - Lawn Solutions Australia

Planning the Ultimate New Year’s Eve Lawn

Are you planning the ultimate New Year’s Eve party or need to get the garden looking good in a hurry and not sure where to start? We’ve put together a guide on how to get your backyard looking great for your New Year’s Eve party!

Getting the lawn ready

Mowing

A quick mow will help get the yard looking tidy for your guests. If it has been left a bit too long over the Christmas period, it is best to bring the height of the lawn back down over a few mows, removing 1/3 of the leaf blade with each mow. This will help avoid causing any extra stress on the lawn.

To help keep the lawn healthy throughout the warmer months regular mowing is key. This will help your lawn maintain a consistent growth pattern and help your lawn become thicker and healthier.

mowing safety gear

Fertilising

Liquid fertilisers like Exceed will be absorbed almost immediately by the leaf of the grass. This provides a much quicker result than granular fertilisers that are absorbed by the grasses roots. This will help give your lawn a quick boost to help improve colour and thicken up your lawn.

exceed liquid fertiliser

Lawn Pigment

A great way to give your lawn an instant green up without harming your lawn is ColourGuard Plus. ColorGuard Plus is a natural organic lawn pigment that helps provide a natural green colour back onto your lawn, especially if you are in a hurry!

colourguard plus

Entertaining

Lighting

Now that you have got the lawn looking great, you can focus on getting entertaining! Lighting is key for entertaining at night and is a great final touch to any outdoor entertaining area!

For illuminating pathways, small garden solar lights on a spike are great as they don’t have any wires that can get damaged. Decorative solar lanterns and are a great feature piece for creating an ambient mood for after dark dinners. Or, if you are after a ‘brighter’ solution, there are lights available that can be mounted up high to light up an entire area.

Fire Pit

A fire pit will put you and your friends marshmallow cooking skills to the test! When using fire pits out on the lawn, find a flat space to help prevent the fire from tipping over. If the fire pit will be out on the lawn, there are a few ways in which you can help avoid scorch marks from forming.

  • Fire bricks and pavers will act as a heat shield, preventing the lawn from becoming burnt.
  • Lightly water the grass underneath the fire pit and continue to water it throughout the night to prevent scorching.
  • Heat resistant shields underneath your fire to reflect heat. These are usually made from aluminium fiberglass.

With this guide, you should have your backyard looking great in no time! From all the Lawn Solutions team we wish you a Happy New Year!

For more backyard inspiration, check out our other blogs here.

Laying a New Lawn in Summer

In summer, warm season turf varieties like buffalo, couch, kikuyu, and zoysia will actively be growing for a quicker establishment. This means your new lawn will be ready to use sooner than you may think! In this blog, we look at how to install and care for a new lawn in summer.

Why lay a new lawn in summer?

The lawn will actively be growing, helping your lawn establish a deep root system fast.

Top tips for laying a lawn in summer

  • Install your turf as soon as it is delivered.
  • If installing a lawn on a larger area, irrigate sections as soon as the turf is laid and then continue to install the rest of the lawn.
  • Give the entire area a really good water after it is laid.
  • Once installed water the lawn enough so the roots of the grass stay damp and don’t dry out. Check the turf every few hours to see if it needs another water.
  • Once the lawn has started to root down into the soil profile you can start to reduce your watering’s.

new lawn

Measure out your area

When measuring out an area for turf, it is best to sketch out your area on a piece of paper first. With your sketch, break up the area into basic shapes, then measure and record your measurements. You can then calculate the amount of turf needed by using our online calculator. We recommend adding an extra 5% to factor in cutting the turf into odd shapes in your lawn.

Measuring for a new lawn

Soil preparation

The first step when preparing your soil is to remove any existing vegetation. We recommend using a non-selective herbicide containing glyphosate such as Roundup or Zero. After applying this it can take a few days to take effect. Then give the area a low mow over to remove the dead plant material. Follow up with a repeat application of glyphosate. With some lawns, you may need to 3-4 repeat applications of glyphosate to fully remove all the vegetation. On your final application, hoe and turn over the existing base to de-compact the soil profile.

For most turf varieties, an underlay of 80mm – 100mm of sandy loam (80% sand, 20% loam) is recommended.

Before you do start to lay your lawn, level out the soil underlay with a rake or a lawn leveller.

The thickness of the turf also needs to be considered, especially if you are wanting your lawn to sit flush with concrete or another surface. Turf will usually be cut 30-40mm thick, so you will need to allow extra space for this. For specific measurements on how thick your turf will be cut at, it is best to have a chat with your local turf supplier.

Need a quote for your new lawn?

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soil

Laying turf

As turf only has a shelf life of 24 hours once it is cut at the farm, it is best to start laying out your lawn as soon as possible to help prevent the turf rolls from drying out.

Lawn starter fertilisers like Lawn Launcher can be spread out onto the soil before the new turf is laid to help give the lawn an extra boost during its establishment.*When installing TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda in summer we don’t recommend using a starter fertiliser as it is a fast-growing grass.

Start off laying the turf furthest away from your exit to avoid walking over the freshly laid turf. Lay the lawn in a brickwork pattern with the edges butted up against each other while ensuring the roll has good contact with the soil underneath.

Once you have finished laying a section of the lawn out, we recommend irrigating each section straight away to help avoid the turf drying out.

When laying turf around trees or corners, use either a spade or shears to cut the turf to size. Keep any excess pieces till the whole area is completed as you may need them later.

After the lawn is installed, give the whole lawn a good water ensuring the roots and soil are damp.

laying new lawn

Aftercare

For the first few weeks after laying your new lawn in summer you will need to keep the water up to the lawn. The number of times you need to water will depend on the weather conditions in your local climate. As a guide, your lawn will need at least 3 short watering’s a day. However, this can change depending on your local climate. For more specific advice on how often you should be watering your new lawn it is best to reach out to your local turf supplier.

After the lawn is fully established, it is best to only water the lawn as it needs. Water in the morning for around 30 mins less frequently will help encourage your lawn to grow down further into the soil profile, improving its drought tolerance. Have a look at our blog for more information on how to tell if your lawn needs a water here.

Your new lawn should be ready for its first mow once the roots of the grass grow down into the soil profile. To see if it is ready, try to lift the corner of a roll of turf from the ground. If you can’t lift the roll from the ground, it is ready to mow. With your first mow, raise the height of the mower on a slightly higher setting than what you would normally mow at. Over the next few mows then slowly bring the height back down.

Once the lawn has been installed for 6 weeks, it should be ready for its first feed. We recommend using a slow release granular fertiliser like our Lawn Solutions Premium Fertiliser.

mowing lawn

For more specific advice on laying turf in your area, it is best to have a chat with your local turf supplier. You can find who your local suppliers are and their contact details here.

Lawn Solutions enewsletter

The Big Short…age

Australian East Coast Experiencing Biggest Turf Shortage Ever Seen

The Australian DIY market has exploded, with the nauseating boredom of endless lock downs and working from home driving even the laziest of folk into action. Why not fix the backyard up? We’ve barely touched it for the greater part of a decade while we’ve lived here, but now’s the time!… said everyone all at once.

But unfortunately gone are the days (for now anyway) of making an order and receiving your turf the next day. You can still purchase freshly harvested turf; however, your delivery may have to be scheduled for a few days or even weeks later. This year it was a perfect storm, with the biggest building boom, the largest flood, and the largest demand for turf in 30 years, creating turf shortages we have never experienced before.

The devastating NSW floods experienced in March have wreaked havoc on supply more than anything else. With the forecast in the lead up being of “minor to moderate flooding,” but what actually developed was “major flooding.” The amount of rain that did come, caused utter destruction. Areas of the Hawkesbury Valley west of Sydney and on the NSW Mid-North Coast were the hardest hit, with over 2,800 hectares of turf production severely impacted.

As Bo Burnham says in his latest comedy special on Netflix, we want to have available to us ‘a little bit of everything all of the time.’ This is about our use of the internet, but this has extended to every single aspect of our lives. We really do want a little bit of everything, all of the time… more than ever. But the reality is we can’t. You want a new car? Sure thing, you can have this white one right now, but for anything else there is a 3 month wait.

The turf industry is obviously no different. But it’s not like the iconic Sir Walter DNA Certified buffalo grass is impossible to get. You might have to wait a little bit for it, but you will get it.

The housing boom has continued to climb with a record 143,700 detached homes commencing construction this year. That’s a lot of new lawns. The building industry naturally as a result has supply constraints up the wazoo, probably because everyone seems to have bucket loads of cash and wants to build, renovate, renew, and extend and it’s absurd to comprehend an interest rate rise… just don’t ask the RBA. That’s like so 2024’s problem, right or is it 2023 now?

The trend for DIY has obviously saturated our tv content as well. Love it or hate it, The Block is like the reincarnation of Hey Hey it’s Saturday. Everyone’s watching it. The ratings are sky high, and it’s just been signed on for another 3 seasons. If The Block was aired exclusively on TikTok they would have to call it BlockTok.

The lesson to be learnt out of all of this… all good things take time… I think.

If you need a new lawn, some turf, the iconic Sir Walter or the new TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda, you may need to wait, but it’ll be worth it. If your local supplier has a waiting list, don’t wait, get on it now.

Talking Turf with Jason Hodges 2

Talking Turf with Jason Hodges 2

Live on Thursday 18th November at 4.30pm AEDT |

Jason Hodges and Joe Rogers from Lawn Solutions Australia will be back for another Facebook Live Q&A event on Thursday the 18th of November.

Hosted Live on the Lawn Solutions Australia Facebook page at 4.30pm AEDT, for 1 hour, this is a special opportunity to ask us whatever you would like about turf, lawns, and gardening.

If you have some questions you would like answered on the day, ask us in the questions section or comment on the announcement post on the Lawn Solutions Australia Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/lawnsolutionsaustralia

Watch the video of the event when live below…