Scott's lawn care service & my horrendous lawn

15 years ago

Hi,

I was hoping someone could offer some advice. We bought our house about a year and half ago. The yard is a mess. Really tough yard to begin with, but part of the mess is the horrific lawn. It is full of crabgrass and on one side of the lawn it is just sand. We have no idea why... it's not near the street or anything so it is not from sanding of the roads that occur in the winter. We are not sure how deep the sand goes. We tried raking it and it seemed kind of deep.... not sure what to do here!

I just called scott's lawncare service and asked them to come in. The prices seems very reasonable to me and I feel overwhelmed with trying to do this myself. We have a new baby and we don't know anything about lawn care. The amount of time it would take me alone to try and figure this out wouldn't be worth it. The first time they treat the lawn it will be 30 dollars and each time after 40 dollars, which is only every 5-6 weeks. They also recommended a yearly lime treatment... he said he was giving me a deal at 40 dollars. He recommended a grub treatment too which is one time and 90 dollars and he said if grubs every show up in our lawn after this one time service, they will replace our whole lawn for free. The guy was so nice and helpful, and I really felt it would be worth it for us to pay someone to take care of this issue while the lawn is in such rough shape.

My husband is annoyed with me for calling scott's. He feels we need to seed the lawn first. I think his feeling is.... you need to have a lawn before you can treat the lawn. Our lawn is pretty bad, mostly weeds. He also thinks we could do this ourselves, which is laughable because we can't seem to get anything done around this house with the baby.

Basically he thinks we don't have enough of a lawn for them to even take care of.... but isn't the whole point to get scott's to come in and get rid of the crabgrass before we can seed anyway? Scott's told me it is better to wait to seed until fall... and they will come in and get rid of the weeds and fertilize this spring.

Doesn't it make sense to get the weed problem taken care of and then worry about filling in the lawn later?

My husband seems to think only people with beautiful lawns get this lawn service... well obviously these people had to start somewhere! I think his worry is once the weeds are gone, there will be no grass and we will have a yard of dirt. Does killing the crabgrass allow grass that we didn't even know was there to sprout up?

Also what do we do about the section with sand? Do we get dirt put down now and try to seed that area now just to get something up in that area?

Also do you think the grub treatment makes sense? I think it probably does because my parents had a huge grub problem that ruined their lawn for years. We live in an area where grubs are a big problem.

Is the lime important?

Thank you so much!!!!!

Featured Answer

bpgreen

15 years ago

last modified: 9 years ago

Asking a bunch of lawn wackos whether you should hire somebody to take care of your lawn is probably not going to get a lot of endorsements for the lawn service.

I used a lawn service for the first year I owned my house and my thinking was much along the same lines as yours. I'd get a professional service to get rid of the weeds and get my grass healthy and after that, I'd be able to do it on my own.

I think they said that they used a specific set of chemicals that they sprayed that was tailored to my lawn and its needs, but the truck that they brought around had a big tank on it and they used the same tank on every lawn. When they would come by, they'd leave a notice on the door with recommendations for how often to cut, water, etc based on the conditions they noted in my lawn. But it was the same every time, regardless of the temperature, rainfall, etc.

To top it off, the weed situation was no better than before and may have even gotten worse.

I also wasn't really comfortable with the little flags they'd put out telling me to keep children and pets off the lawn for a minimum of X days because of the treatments.

So I took matters into my own hands. I read things from the extension offices and started doing things that are pretty close to what gets recommended around here. Things started improving. Then I found various lawncare forums and things got even better.

One humorous (or maddening?) thing happened a few years after I stopped using the lawn care service. A sprinkler head broke and a section of the lawn went dormant because it wasn't getting any water (the only water lawns get here is from sprinklers). One of the lawncare services pulled up and told me that I had a serious grub problem and needed to treat it right away. They went out to the area that was dormant and started pulling up sections of grass and telling me that it was due to grubs. I knew it was because of lack of water and suggested that as the cause, and they started launching into an explanation of why they knew that wasn't it. I then turned on the sprinkler in that section and showed them that it wasn't working, but they still tried to tell me it was grubs.

Anyway, the main things you want to do are the following:

Water deeply and infrequently. Apply an inch of water a week, but only water once a week if you can (in the desert, I often have to water twice a week, or once every 5 days, anyway). Adjust the amount (or the frequency) you water for any rainfall. This has a couple of benefits. First, it promotes deep roots, so the grass can better deal with periods of drought. I call grass a lazy plant, because it will only put down roots as deeply as it needs to for the water it gets. If the top inch of soil is always wet, the grass will have roots that are only an inch deep. Second, letting the ground dry between waterings will discourage weed seeds from germinating, because they need moisture to germinate.

Mulch mow and mow at the highest setting of your mower and never cut more than 1/3 of the blade at one time. Mulch mowing returns water and nutrients to the soil and improves the health of the soil. It doesn't contribute to thatch and can actually contribute to getting rid of it. Mowing at the highest setting helps to make the grass stronger because it gives more surface area for photosynthesis. It also helps shade the surface so the roots are better able to deal with heat and drought. Also, it helps keep weeds from thriving because the weeds need sunlight.

Fertilize once in the spring and twice in the fall.

If you're using weed killers, don't use the weed and feed products (another reason I don't like the services--the one size fits all means they fertilize and kill weeds at the same time). Instead, spot spray weeds that you see sprout up.

As for the lime, did they do a soil test? If not, there's no way to know whether lime is needed. Some areas tend to have low pH soils, but you don't know what the prior owner did. The prior owner may have applied lime regularly and heavily and raised the pH too high. If so, I wouldn't do anything to lower the pH because that will happen anyway, but you need to know if it needs lime before adding it.

I guess my comment on the grubs is similar. Do you have grubs? If not, the grub treatment makes a lot more sense for the lawn service than it does for you.

Comments (9)

iforgotitsonevermind
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
No people with beautiful lawns don't get that service. On the contrary, people like you that are are overwhelmed, got a lot going on in their lives and have not so great lawns get the service thinking the nice friendly guy that comes out and tells you about all the treatments you need, really is going to make all your problems go away.

The fact is, they're going to come out and spend 5 minutes a month in your lawn for that $30-$40 and they aren't going to do anything you can't do with a $8 bag of fertilizer or a $20 bag of weed preventer.

What they won't do is mow your lawn at proper intervals at the right height, they won't water your lawn, they won't overseed your lawn. They're just going to spray stuff. A lot of stuff you don't need and a lot of stuff you certainly don't want if you got a little one playing in the grass.

Now that we got that out of the way, let's make something perfectly clear. You DO NOT HAVE CRABGRASS. Crabgrass is a summer annual that forms in sunny areas with poor drainage. If a lawn service said you have crabgrass, do not give them any more consideration. That's not to say you won't get crabgrass in the summer but a $16 bag of halts crabgrass preventer applied in early spring will prevent it and you can apply it yourself in 5 minutes with a spreader. There's no need to pay someone a recurring fee to do this.
If you'd prefer not to have to use these chemicals, then fix any drainage problems in your yard with proper grading and adding drains if necessary. Thicken up your turf with fertilizer at the appropriate times, don't mow too low and don't overwater your lawn. There that costs you nothing.

If you have grubs, treat for grubs, if you don't, don't. If you want to do it anyway, a $12 bag of season-long insecticide is available at a hardware store near you and you can apply it with a spreader.

If you have bare areas, seed them.
If you have thinning areas, overseed them.
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sophie12
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'd advise watching Scotts very closely! They came out (at my request) for an estimate. I had a good laugh at the estimate! Wondered what their "professional" who came out was smoking,,,,,,,,all the weeds they listed as "problems in my yard were in the neighbors yard, and I have very clearly defined lot lines that anyone can see, like raised beds seperating my yard from the neighbors. They called my soil as "loam" when in fact I have losse hills clay, the only loam is in the flower beds where I have been adding very large amounts of compost and top soil yearly to make the clay decent for growing in. And they estemated my yard at over three times the size it is. OOPS.....they didn't get my business!
lou_spicewood_tx
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Sophie, that's funny. I got a brochure from TruGreen the other day and they wrote "we do organic too!" on it. I laughed at it and tore it up and threw them in the trash.
iforgotitsonevermind
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Those services are pretty desperate right now due to the economy and people cutting back on non0essentials. They send those flyers in the mail once or twice a month (the various services we have here) and they go door to door.
dchall_san_antonio
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
One of the guys I occasionally work with used to be the salesman for one of the nationwide lawn companies in San Antonio. Sorry I forgot which one. Anyway he knows nothing about grass or weeds...but he's a good salesman! He had a training manual with photos of grass, weeds, grubs, mushrooms, and clover. All he had to do was show the homeowner the scary things he might get and he made the sale. He literally BS'd his way through every sales pitch with scare tactics. Some homeowners only bit on the "join the bandwagon" approach where he explained that all the neighbors were going with a lawn spray service and he would be the only one on the street with a brown lawn.
peter6345
8 years ago
Scotts is a joke!!!! I have a degree in turf grass management.They know nothing about organics. Dont let them fool you. I work in New York State as a organic Sports Turf Manager
Tom
8 years ago
Yep, there's nothing like good ole fashioned- "green thumb type sense" ........and its not something you can package , institutionalize or skim over. I am thinking about the Super Bowl just passed, and how the talk was how revolutionary and complex the prep was for the super bowl sod. Turns out the field sucked, because they "over killed" the maint. .......and actually had turf more suited for a golf fairway, and not a football field. It was seeded too heavily with rye, and cut too short, which made a impossible for players cleats to get a grip. Players were slipping and sliding all over the place. Not only that, the turf didn't have very good color. Oh well, don't get me started :-)
dchall_san_antonio
8 years ago
Hello Peter. I took some turf classes in school and found out when I got to this forum that I had to forget about 90% of what I thought I had knew. Granted my school was in the early 70s, and a lot of learning has gone on since then, but don't be surprised if we don't follow the rules you learned. We will be happy to explain why we do it different.

I hope you stick around and comment freely. Those of us with opinions love to share them, and sometimes we learn from other people with opinions. It would be interesting to learn how you provide organic care on a large scale. Doing it for individual homes is fairly easy, but for large scale operations, that's a lot of organic tonnage to move around.

Scott's lawn care service & my horrendous lawn

bpgreen

Comments (9)

iforgotitsonevermind

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