Fall is fast approaching and with it comes an opportunity to restore your lawn after the heat of summer. The Blue Crew at Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping recommend the following steps to restore your lawn.
Weed Control
When your grass is struggling and thinning out, weeds take the opportunity to grow and spread. If you are planning to overseed your grass, you cannot put a pre-emergent on your lawn because it will keep your seeds from growing. We recommend spot spraying a post-emergent spray to kill clumps of weeds. If there are just a few weeds, it is easier to just pull them up. In either case, they need to be removed before you overseed your lawn, or they will crowd the new grass out.
Mark Sprinkler Heads To Avoid Damaging Them
Flag And Adjust Sprinklers
Before going any further in your lawn restoration, it is important to mark where your sprinkler heads are so you do not rip them out when dethatching or aerating your lawn. You can buy small flags on thin wires from big box stores and nurseries and use them to mark each head. Marking them gives you a chance to repair any sprinkler heads that are damaged or don’t work properly. In addition, it is important to adjust your sprinkler to water the new seeds you are planting. If you fail to do this, your new grass will have a hard time establishing itself.
Dethatch
Thatch is a layer of dead grass, roots, and debris that builds up between the grass and the soil surface. It can form an almost impenetrable layer that keeps water, nutrients, and air from reaching the roots. Any time thatch is one inch thick or deeper, you need to remove it. Before you overseed, dethatch so your seeds can reach the soil surface and grow.
For a small yard, you can use a dethatching rake to rip out the dead grass and roots. If you have a large yard, you will want to rent a dethatching machine. Dethatching rakes work great, but they are tiring to use. After dethatching your lawn, rake the debris up and compost it or throw it away. Water your lawn until the soil is saturated with water before you move to the next step.
Aerate
Plants absorb water, nutrients, and air from the soil around them. When the soil gets compacted, these things have a hard time penetrating the surface. To fix that, you want to rent a core aerator and run it across the lawn. Watering the lawn before aerating helps the aerator get as deep as it needs to in the soil. Aerators punch holes in the soil and leave the soil they remove on your lawn in plugs. After you aerate, rake these plugs until they fall into the grass. They will dissolve the next time you water.
Overseed
The easiest way to overseed a lawn is to use a push spreader. Set the dispersal rate according to the grass seed package instructions. Walk back and forth in one direction, such as north to south, then walk back and forth in the other way, such as east to west. This provides plenty of seed everywhere in the lawn. Missing a spot leaves a thin area that does not look good.
Top Dress With Peat Moss or Compost
After you seed the lawn, spread about an inch of peat moss or compost on your lawn. Rake it in so the amendments touch the ground. This will provide the seeds with a burst of nitrogen that is slow enough releasing to avoid burning the seedlings.
Fertilize
Now is a good time to fertilize your lawn, too. Pick a fall fertilizer and spread it according to the label instructions. Cover the lawn in one direction, then in the perpendicular direction to get good coverage.
New Grass Needs More Water
Water
After you sow your seeds, top dress them, and fertilize the lawn, water the yard well. This dissolves the plugs from aerating the soil, tells the seeds to germinate, and moves the nutrients from the top dressing and fertilizing into the root zone so the grass can use them. Make sure you don’t let any water run off into the storm drain. That wastes your expensive seed, top dressing, and fertilizer and pollutes streams and rivers.
Care Guide
If this sounds like a lot of work that is because it is a lot of work. Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping can do your fall lawn restoration for you. Simply subscribe to our lawn care program and enjoy your yard. We will even leave a detailed care guide for you to follow to maximize success. Call (816) 825-2524 for the details and to sign up.
Insect pollinators pollinate roughly two-thirds of the food we eat and around 85% of the flowers in the world. However, insects are struggling in the modern world. Planting a pollinator garden is one way to help them. In addition, butterflies and other pollinators are fun to watch as they flit from plant to plant.
What Pollinators Need
Pollinators need food, water, shelter, and safety. Planting a variety of plants is the best way to meet these needs. Here are some suggestions.
A flower garden full of food for pollinators
Food
Pollinators need three types of food: nectar, pollen, and foliage. Most pollinators have larva that eat foliage to get the energy to grow and reproduce. For example, Monarch butterflies need milkweed in their caterpillar phase. As adults, Monarchs feed on nectar. Some pollinators need both nectar and pollen to eat, such as honeybees.
When picking plants for pollinators, pick a range of sizes and shapes to maximize the pollinators you attract. In addition, plan what you plant so that there will be something in bloom from early spring through to the first frost. Native plants attract the most pollinators and require the least maintenance. We can recommend the perfect native plant for any space.
Water
While some pollinators get all the water they need from their food, others need a source of water. Bees and other insects can drown in deep water, however. Using a shallow saucer with pebbles in it as a bee fountain can prevent drownings. Just remember, in the heat of summer you will have to add water every day or the saucer will dry out.
A Bee Box For Solitary Bees To Nest In
Shelter
Pollinators need shelter to raise their young and to escape predators. Leaving a corner of earth bare allows ground-dwelling bees and other pollinators to nest there. Leaving plant stalks that are hollow standing after deadheading the flowers allows pollinators to nest in them. Mount bee blocks in your garden to give solitary bees a place to nest. Once a block is used up, you can discard the hollow tubes in early spring after the larvae have left and replace them with new tubes. Trees and shrubs give insects and hummingbirds places to hide from birds and other predators.
A Monarch Caterpillar On Milkweed
Safety
The best way to help pollinators in your garden is to use as few pesticides as possible. Pesticides kill beneficial insects as well as pests. Native plants and insects have evolved with one another, and the plants can tolerate a low level of insects feeding on them.
If you must spray, use the least toxic pesticide you can, spray in the late evening when pollinators are not present, and try to avoid spraying the flowers of the plant. Tolerating a low level of caterpillar damage is necessary to have butterflies. For example, the caterpillars of the Black-Winged Swallowtail Butterfly eat dill, fennel, and related plants. Plant enough to share if you want the butterflies around.
How We Can Help
If you are interested in attracting more pollinators, Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping can work with you to pick annuals and perennials that pollinators like that will thrive in the space you have. Your yard will look bright and attractive to you and the area pollinators. Give us a call or schedule a consultation to learn more.
Research over a range of states has shown that well landscaped properties increase in value 10-12 percent over just having a lawn. We talked to our BNI realtor partner Veronica Jaster, with ReeceNichols on the Koehler-Borthnick Team, to find out what that means for Kansas City homeowners.
Curb Appeal
Landscaping increases curb appeal. When a person first sees a home, the landscaping is what they see before the inside. Poor landscaping can make it very difficult to sell a house.
For example, Jaster and her partner had been following a house that was listed on the market in May of 2021 and didn’t sell when priced at 350K. The owner asked Jaster and her partner to sell the home.
Before her partner and she listed the house, they met with the homeowner and pointed out several landscaping problems like overgrown shrubs, an overhang that was too short and would hit a tall person, and some other things.
The homeowner corrected the problems and the home sold for 377K after just a few days.
Curb Appeal Transformation
Before
Demo Started
Blue Crew In Action
Planting Complete
Stone Work Finished
Entry Planter Filled
Sophisticated Designs
Several researchers have found that sophisticated landscape designs cause the value of the home to increase. Simple lawn and foundation plantings by themselves are not good enough. It takes multiple landscape beds with well planted and maintained landscapes and mature trees to really increase the value. Neighborhoods that have sophisticated landscape designs likewise increase the value of a person’s property.
Jaster says that before the pandemic, a house with a pool was a neutral feature or it could actually lower the price of the home. Since the pandemic, a pool that is meticulously landscaped can increase the value of a home from 100-200k.
Right now people are looking for houses with beautiful outdoor living areas so they can entertain properly. Outdoor structures with kitchens, shade, and other amenities make that more enjoyable.
Meticulously Landscaped
The key to improving the value of your home is meticulously maintaining the landscape. Poorly maintained landscaping with overgrown and dying shrubbery, as with the previous example, can make the house hard to sell. Recently, Jaster sold a home on a 1-acre lot in a subdivision that showcased some excellent landscaping. The property was listed for one day with an asking price of 1.35 million. It sold in a bidding war for 1.5 million. The buyers stated that the home’s curb appeal and first impression are what really stood out to them.
Schedule Your Landscape Upgrade
Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping can not only install outdoor living areas of all kinds, but we can maintain them as well. In fact, one of our clients just won home of the month after our garden care visit. For more information on how we can increase the value of your home, call (816) 825-2524 or schedule a consultation.
Grubs are the larva of May/June beetles, masked chafers, Japanese beetles, and green June beetles. While the adult beetles can cause problems, it is the larva that cause dead spots in the lawn.
Grubs are white insects with a brown head. When disturbed, they curl in a C shape. The larger the grub is, the harder it is to kill. Damage due to grubs usually becomes noticeable in July and August, when the grubs are in their third instar or growth period.
Symptoms of Grubs
Grubs feed on the roots of turfgrass. When the roots of the grass are eaten, the grass wilts easily, then dies in irregular patches. You can pull on the turf above the surface of the ground and it will pull away easily. In fact, you can roll the turf up like a carpet.
Treating For Grubs
There are two kinds of treatments for grubs. The first is a stomach poison, which kills the grub after they eat roots with pesticide in them. The second is contact poison, where the poison is in the soil and the grub touches it. Both types of insecticides are effective when used properly.
Applications of insecticide are done in late July/early August in our area. You should water with about half an inch of water two or three days before pesticide application to bring the grubs up to the surface, where the insecticide can reach them. Spread the pesticide and carefully follow the directions on the package. After applying a granular insecticide, water the lawn with at least half an inch of water to drive the insecticide deep enough in the lawn to kill the grubs.
Problems After Treatment
If the thatch in your lawn is deeper than half an inch, it will absorb most of the insecticide. Since grubs don’t eat thatch, they will not be poisoned. Aerate or verticut your lawn to remove the thatch before treating the lawn if the thatch is deep. The other problem is caused by not watering enough after an insecticide application, so the poison doesn’t reach the grubs. In either case, you will not control the grubs despite the cost and effort of applying pesticides, so be sure to be thorough and diligent.
We Kill Grubs
Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping’s Blue Crew will kill the grubs in your lawn. We will also reseed the lawn, if needed, when fall arrives. Sign up for our lawn care subscription and we will make sure thatch doesn’t build up, the lawn irrigation is doing its job, and any grubs are treated and destroyed. Call (816) 825-2524 to sign up and let us handle the grubs.
Bagworms are a real threat to both evergreen and deciduous trees and shrubs. They are unsightly and weaken the host plant. Bagworms attack many species of trees but prefer evergreens. They defoliate the tree they live on, damaging it or even killing it if the infestation is severe.
Description
When the caterpillar hatches, it crawls out of the bag it hatched from. Bagworms start weaving their own bag immediately. The silk is covered in plant debris and can be hard to see when the bagworms are young. Most people start to notice bagworms in August and September when they are one to two inches long.
Life Cycle
The larvae hatch in May and early June. They grow through the summer and continue to add organic matter to their bag for camouflage. In September, the bagworm attaches its bag to a twig. The bags look like Christmas tree ornaments all over the tree.
In the fall, a female bagworm is ready to mate. She has no wings or legs and is inside her protective bag. The males hatch in September and crawl into the bag and mate with the female. She lays 100-200 eggs inside the bag and dies. The eggs overwinter in the mother’s bag.
Control
The most practical method of control is to pick the bags off the tree and crush them, then throw them in the trash. Removing the bags not only kills the eggs and larvae within, but it also prevents that generation from reproducing more bagworms.
The bag around the caterpillar makes chemical control difficult. Chemicals need to be applied to the foliage, not the bag. Spraying a pesticide on the tree that the caterpillar will ingest along with the needles or leaves of the tree is the best way to kill them. The younger the caterpillar, the easier it is to kill it. By August, the bagworm is mature and is not feeding much, so chemical control is unlikely. Don’t waste your time or money on chemicals then.
Both Bacillus thuringiensis and Spinosad will control young bagworms when applied to the foliage. These pesticides are allowed in organic gardening. Products containing acephate, cyfluthrin, or permethrin are also effective chemical control agents when applied to the foliage in early summer. Wet the foliage completely with any pesticide you use, or you will not get good coverage.
We Can Help
Royal Creations Architectural Landscaping customers will be relieved to know that we can treat trees for bagworms. We have the proper equipment and know-how to safely spray every inch of your tree or shrub to kill bagworms before they defoliate your plants. To subscribe to our garden care program, call our office at (816) 825-2524 or schedule a consult.
