Safe yes, but like Bill said, too early. Wait until the forsythia start blooming, then fertilize. At that point, the grass will have broken dormancy and started to grow. It's still a big shot of nitrogen awfully early, but at least it won't be wasted...

I would suggest you not use any broadly applied herbicides or pesticides this year. No sense chancing stressing the turf. and at the very least check the label for advisories regarding applying. A half pound/k of NPK every two weeks applied to dry blades and then watered in until mid June will be beneficial for the sod. As far as fertilizing new sod or grass, what follows is the best advice I've ever found: "The Philes Phertilizer Lecture follows: These new KBG lawns are hungry for fertilizer. Very much like, (and if you renovated, exactly like) a sod farm, those guys that start with bare ground, throw some seed around, and by late July of every year, they are selling product: a deeply rooted, dense intertwined dark green carpet of lush (no bare spots) Kentucky Bluegrass. Now how do they do that every year? (And, of course, the implied question "How come you and I can't do it also?") They do it with frequent, rather than heavy, applications of fertilizer. Literally, every two weeks, a light application of fertilizer. At seeding time, they start with an 8-8-8 or a 10-10-10. Upon the grass reaching the 'first mow' stage, they add Milorganite, and then it's Milorganite every two weeks, as the weather gets warmer. Every two weeks would seem to you (and in the old days, to me) as 'excessive'. It's not. Not only is it not excessive, it may well be Required. There's only one difference between the sod farm, with that lush green grass for sale every year, and the typical homeowner here (I'm leaving out the general public: the public is a 2 or a 3, as you know, and you guys and gals are a 6 or a 7. Twice as good. But I'm trying to get y'alls up to a 9, which is where the sod farm is), and that difference is Frequent Applications of Fertilizer. Especially with KBG, more fertilizer than you are used to putting down is good. A typical homeowner would fertilize once in the fall. Not the first year, but every following year, on these newly renovated (or overseeded) KBG lawns, two full applications are required in the fall. Spring? A lot of people don't like to fertilize in the spring. A KBG lawn requires an application of big-first-number fertilizer, in May. A newly renovated KBG lawn requires yet another application in mid June. That lawn needs the nitrogen, for all the growing, both above, below, and across the ground, that it's wanting to do, and will do, if you feed it. Density? It requires nitrogen. Color? Requires more nitrogen. Aggressiveness? You already know what it requires. Even an old KBG lawn, the Merion sods of this world, needed more nitrogen than they received. As proof, drive through the subdivisions of ten or twenty years ago, and look at the lawns: those lawns were not exactly treated like a sod farm, were they? If you want your new lawn to turn out just like that, here's all you have to do: fertilize once in the fall, and once in the spring. That's it. The results are guaranteed. By now, somebody is saying (and should be), "Is it possible to OVER fertilize a lawn?" Yes, it's possible. But not what you'd think. The 'typical' overfertilize stripes that we all seem to fear came from the old drop spreaders, when the rows were overlapped. That overlap caused a doubling of the fertilizer along that narrow, overlapped row, and it was all delivered in one day. What most people forget, while imagining the scorn of neighbors and children, is that those bands of over fertilization did not last until fall, they went away in less than a month. Repeat: the so called over fertilization went away, in less than a month. The homeowner had not created another Love Canal toxic zone, the homeowner had instead managed to put down more than the grass could handle all at once, but in fact the lawn handled it, and probably even needed it. The lawn just didn't need it all at once. Nor in summer's heat. Disaster? No. Bad delivery technique? Yes. It wasn't too much fertilizer, it was too much fertilizer all at once, and there's a difference, isn't there? These days, with the rotary far-flinging spreaders, a more evenly spread application of fertilizer is the norm. Now that we want to emulate the sod farms (and their turf success), we know that there's no sin in putting down a half application, in one direction, and putting down the other half application, in the other direction a week later. Now that we want to emulate the sod farms, we will want to feed the lawn during summer, rather than letting it starve while it battles the hot summer sun. So Milorganite, or other organic fertilizer is required, rather than a big-first number fertilizer. At least once in summer, but if you've renovated, or over seeded, that new KBG needs two applications. It needs the food. So there's my recommendation for the renovators and overseeders: two applications in the fall (not the first year, on the seedlings, they can't use the food yet, as they haven't grown enough yet) at least one application in the spring (two if you renovated or overseeded. That application we skipped last fall goes down the following spring), and you must feed the lawn in the summer: that new KBG needs the food. So here we are, end of August. You know you are going to fertilize in the fall, probably twice, and perhaps didn't do enough during spring or summer. You can do a half application right now, of big first number fertilizer, or a full application of Milorganite. And still do the regular fertilizing when fall gets here. But your lawn likely needs the meal, and if you provide that light meal right now, before fall gets here, I think you'll love the visible results. Good luck with it."

Your situation sounds like mine. Lots of helpful discussion here. the milorganite really helped green things up, as did somewhat more aggressive watering. Here is a link that might be useful: Thread I started

While Trugreen has a 6-step program, we have a basic 3-step program to which you can add a few things only if you need it. They will apply all 6 regardless of whether you need them and regardless of when you need them. The three steps only apply to chemical fertilizers and are as follows: fertilize on Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Thanksgiving. Another problem with Trugreen is they use spray fertilizers. Those are only good for 2 weeks, so unless they come back every 2 weeks, they run out fast. You need pounds of nitrogen on the ground, not fractions of an ounce. When you apply chemicals be sure to read the entire bag first. Use the right setting and apply when the climate is with you. Don't apply in advance of a rainstorm. Apply after the rain storm. If you have weeds in the spring, and I suspect you will (see my previous reply), then do what I said in my previous reply. That would be a step in the early spring. Do not fertilize with chemicals in the early spring no matter how much pressure you get from your partner, neighbors, advertising, etc. If you really want to make this easy, you can go with an organic program. With organics you can throw out all the rules. You don't have to worry about when you apply or how much or whether you applied too much or applied before a storm. There is almost no way to go wrong. In fact as I sit here thinking, I can't think of a way to go wrong...unless you use compost or manure. Otherwise just using organic fertilizer is what I call, "no hassle" lawn care. If you are interested in this low cost, low hassle approach, find the Organic Lawn Care FAQ over in the GW Organic Gardening forum. Come back here and ask your questions after you've read it. Before I went organic I used to fret over my lawn all year every year. Since 2002, life is good. No matter which approach you take, you should water deeply and infrequently. Deeply means start with an inch of water (measured with tuna or cat food cans). Infrequently means you wait until the grass looks thirsty. In the winter it won't ever look thirsty but water monthly anyway just to keep the microbes in the soil moist. In the spring you will be watering monthly for awhile and gradually work your way up to watering every 7 days in the hottest heat of summer. Then as the temps back off you will be watering less and less often. I was watering every 10 days all summer until we had rain about 2 weeks ago. It has cooled off and I have not watered since. We're back into the 90s now so I'm watching it again for signs of drying out. Watering is something Trugreen will not help you with. If you do this wrong, it won't matter who is taking care of your lawn.