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Fall Lawn Fertilizing

Even though the lawn mowing season is almost over, there's still work to do! If you are going to fertilize your lawn, this is the time of year to do it. Fall fertilizing is the best time of year to put down some material to feed your lawn, so that next spring it will be all lush and green!

You fertilize in fall because it's cooler and the soil is moist. When you put the fertilizer down, you won't get that really big lush, green growth that you get when you put it on in the spring, We've all seen that growth and then you're out there mowing every few days to keep up with it.

If you fertilize in the fall, because of the short days, you don't get that lush green growth but you do feed the roots.

Now, you've got to use the right fertilizer. You want to purchase one with a 3-1-2 ratio, or something close to that. If we take a look at the bag, this one is a three, one, five but it's close enough.

The 3 is the amount of nitrogen in it, so you will get some nice green growth with the nitrogen. The 5 is how much potash, or potasium  and that's good for the hardiness and the vigor of the lawn. The middle number is phosphorus and that has to be low because in Vermont, most of our lawns already have a lot of phosphorus in them, and if you put too much phosphorus down, it's going to leach out and get into the lakes and streams and rivers and cause pollution. Look for a low phosphorus fertilizer like this one or even a no phosphorus fertilizer.

Then, of course, you want an organic fertilizer because it's a slow release product and it really feeds the microbes in the soil.

You can use a drop spreader or one of these hand held spreaders and when your applying the fertilizer you want to take half of your fertilizer and spread it in one direction and then take the other half and spread it in the perpendicular direction. That way you'll get an even spread of fertilizer over the whole lawn and you won't get little spots that are greener than others.

Because it's organic you don't have to worry if you get this fertilizer on your hands or worry about your pets or kids. This fertilizer is organic, made from alfalfa, molasses, and a number of other materials, and it's safe for pets and wildlife and  yourself, too.

By Charlie Nardozzi