The Green View

From Lawn to Landscape...enhancing mother nature's gifts

Your lawn is the canvas; your landscape is the finished work of art. A well-designed landscape can bring you unending pleasure on many levels. Your community enjoys the view, you increase your property’s resale value and the colorful birds of the air seek sanctuary in your yard. The cardinals, chickadees, finches and other birds specific to your locale are feeding in the spring, so be sure to have plenty of Lyric Wild Bird Food on hand. Hours and hours of enjoyment are yours when nature is your entertainment.

So you have a lawn and it’s beautiful. Planting trees, shrubbery and plants around the lawn may seem pretty straightforward. But if you attempt this without a plan, you may end up with less than picture-perfect results.

On the other hand, if you spend some time organizing and laying a design on paper, creating a visual  representation of your property with key yard-house-people relationships in mind, the result can be astounding! Most importantly, you’ll want to organize your plantings and decorations to ensure maximum usefulness as well as aesthetics. Every entrance and exit to your home will be enhanced if the function and decor are properly designed.

Being realistic is also a key to successful landscaping that has long lasting beauty. With the vast array of plants, flowers, trees and decorations available on the market today, it’s easy to overdo it. So keep in mind that you also want to reduce the maintenance of your landscape so that it’s practical. If in your design, you consider the time and resources you have, this will help you enjoy it for years to come without regrets.

Some varieties of plants or other materials in the landscape may take up a great deal of space and leave little room for people, and that’s another great reason why planning is essential---to make your landscape livable. And for your landscape plantings, our line of Woodace Tree, Shrub and Plant fertilizers will keep your new and established floras and evergreens healthy and strong throughout all of their growth stages.

Landscape Design Basics…

Most homeowners are not experienced landscape designers, but the “do-it-yourself-er” and even the amateur gardener can very adequately design their own outdoor environment by following a few important principles:

First, observe and analyze the habits of all who will be using the space, including adults, children and pets. List their needs, desires, and activities. Figure out about how much space each of their activities requires. Also pay careful attention to the view in and around your property and to the ecology of the site, for a “greener” way to landscape.

Recognize that the art of landscaping differs from other forms of art because it grows and changes from season to season. A newly landscaped property will hold a promise of blooms and views to come and may look a bit scant at the start. But with time, each specimen and flower bed will grow to fill its intended space and add a variety of color and texture for every month of the year.

In your plan, consider landscape construction too, where walls, pathways, water features lighting or other accents may add symmetry, depth, drama or just another level of enjoyment. For example, a trellis brimming with vines and flowers can be a welcoming entry or a dramatic exit to a garden or pathway. After all that work, decorating with comfortable benches will be a welcome site for the weary gardener or admiring guest.

Finally, consider landscaping to attract birds. Every species of bird has its own unique food requirements, and these may change as the bird matures and as the seasons change. Plant the trees, shrubs, or flowers that will provide the fruits, berries, grains, seeds, acorns, nuts, or nectar they crave. Want more birds? Position plenty of feeders using our Lyric Wild Bird Food for all four seasons and provide a constant and fresh source of water. A frog pond, water garden, or bird  bath will be most effective if the water is dripping, splashing, or moving. Trees, shrubs, tall grass, and bird houses will provide excellent shelter for the birds and protect them from predators. Include a wide variety of plants in your landscape plan to attract a greater number of bird species that will amaze the avid birder.

Using both Greenview lawn and landscape and Lyric Wild Bird Food products, in concert, will make it easy for you to transform your landscape into a work of art—one that will become more than something to admire. It will be an extension of your living space—a true outdoor adventure where you can appreciate and share the wonders of nature with family and friends throughout the year.

Content courtesy of Texas A&M and Baltimore Bird Club.

Images courtesy of By Design Landscaping, Superior Landscaping Solutions, Bird Watchin and Landscape Design Advice.

Submitted by J. Weinmann

Zero Phosphate Fertilizers from Greenview

Do you want a healthy and beautiful green lawn this fall? With Greenview's Zero Phosphate Fall Fertilizer you will get the lawn you always wanted while being "Eco-Friendly" to the environment.

Phosphorous, which young grass needs for root development is usually not needed by mature or well established lawns.  Before choosing a fertilizer it is a good idea to perform a soil test to determine if your lawn needs additional phosphorous. A recent university study concluded that most home lawns have adequate amounts of phosphorous which is delivered naturally from the break down of leaves and plants.

So what are the benefits of using Greenview's Zero Phosphate Fertilizers with slow release nitrogen?  Greenview fertilizers contain a patented slow release technology and are environmentally friendly because they release nutrients slowly over a period of weeks, allowing the grass plant to take up the nutrients. 

Remember, during the fall most home lawns do not need additional phosphorous supplements, so now is the perfect time to use Greenview's Zero Phosphate Fall Fertilizer!

The Lebanon Seaboard Corporation is a proud member of The Chesapeake Bay Program.  Read how they are supporting this important environmental stewardship initiative.

Lawn Thatch How-To

What is lawn thatch?

Thatch is a dense layer of decaying plant matter that accumulates at the surface of the soil.  A small layer of thatch is acceptable because it helps retain moisture and prevent soil compaction.  But when thatch becomes too thick it prevents fertilizer and water from reaching the roots of the grass making them weak.  This build-up of decomposing matter causes your lawn to be more prone to diseases, weeds, thinning, and less tolerant to harsh weather conditions.

How do I check for lawn thatch?

Checking your lawn for thatch is easy.  Cut out a section of your lawn and measure the thatch build-up near the top.  The recommended amount of thatch, which is healthy for your grass, is between 1/4 inch to 1/2 inch.

How do I prevent thatch?

Do not apply too much quick release nitrogen fertilizer and do not water your lawn lightly and frequently.  Both of these lawn care practices allow your lawn to grow excessively fast and causes more thatch build-up.  Watering your grass lightly and frequently causes the grass to root near the surface in the thatch.  If you water deeply but infrequently this allows the grass roots to grow deeper into the soil allowing a healthier and stronger root system for your lawn.  Using Greenview Fairway Formula Fertilizers can also help you prevent lawn thatch!

Also a common myth to thatch build-up is from grass clippings left on the lawn after mowing.  This, however, is totally untrue.  These clippings add nutrients to the soil and decompose quickly, so you wont have to go the extra mile to bag them up.

How do I de-thatch my lawn?

The time to de-thatch is before the grass's prime growing season, usually during spring or in early fall.  Manually de-thatching your lawn is the process of raking through the lawn, which can be rather time consuming, but it is less stressing on your lawn than using a power de-thatcher.  Manual de-thatching is suggested for small to medium size lawns with about an inch of thatch.  For larger lawns or if you have a greater amount of thatch, you can rent a power de-thatcher of hire someone to do it for you.  This process may cause your lawn to look rather messy, but it will recover in no time with the growing season right ahead.  Lastly, always make sure that you rake up all debris and thatch when you are finished.

The Best Time to Apply Fertilizers

Wondering about the best time to apply fertilizer? Here are some quick tips from the Greenview Fertilizer website to make it easy for you.

• In the spring, the best time to apply fertilizer is after 3 mowings. Apply .5 to 1 pound of nitrogen per 1000 square feet to support growth and to build-up reserves for summer.
• Cool season grasses go dormant in the summer and fertilizing at this time is not recommended.  If you have a warm season grass, your lawn requires frequent fertilization as it grows all summer and needs the added nutrients to maintain health and color.
• Another important time to fertilize is in the fall to help the grass develop a strong root system. Apply 1.5 to 2.5 pounds of nitrogen per 1000 square feet (Use the higher amount if your lawn is Kentucky bluegrass or perennial ryegrass, soil is sandy, or grass clippings are not returned to the lawn.)
• Check out the Greenview Annual Lawn Plan where lawn care experts provide recommendations for your lawn program.  They even tell you when and how to apply each fertilizer and weed control treatment - so you get the best results.  The Greenview Annual Lawn Plan makes it easy - all you do is push the spreader!

Greenview - Growing Lawns for 60 Years!

Robotic Lawn Mowers - The Advantage is Yours.

      Robotic lawn mowers are now available in sizes suited for any lawn size and there are quite a few advantages to robotic mowing aside from the obvious fact that you don’t need to push or drive them.

      One of the most important advantages is that they are environmentally friendly. Government studies have shown that a gasoline powered lawn mower can belch out more emissions than a typical SUV. In addition, spillage of gasoline and improper motor oil disposal is in the millions of gallons every year. By comparison, robotic mowers run on electricity and most use about as much juice as a 100 watt light bulb. A larger unit, capable of handling more than five acres, will use about as much as a standard refrigerator.

     Tired of all the noise ruining your little corner of paradise? Robotic mowers produce little noise and are even quiet enough to run at night without upsetting your neighbor.

     These robotic wonders also provide advantages related to the health of your lawn. One of the things that cause the most stress on a lawn is cutting it. The accepted rule of thumb is that no more than one third of the blade length should be removed with each mowing. To stick to this rule, most people would have to cut more than they do now which is not very appealing. With a robotic mower, you can set it to cut as often as you like and it will be happy to do so.

     The Belrobotics Bigmow and KA LawnBott series are designed to run daily and just trim the tips of the grass. This maintains the lawn in a way that would make a golf course manager green with envy.

     The Robomower acts more like a traditional mower in that it has three mulching chambers that reduce clippings to a very small size. It can handle the “one third rule” without leaving any turf smothering clumps. If you are the type of person that likes razor straight stripes, you would have to learn to do without. All of the units cut from different angles with each mowing. Fortunately, this is the recommended mowing method for healthy grass and the results will appear more as a sea of green than that of a baseball field.

     If you want a beautiful lawn with less effort, robotic mowing just might deserve a look.

Probotics provides a robotic lawn mower selection guide that may help you decide.

Summer Lawn Care

Children and adults enjoy walking across soft, springy grass.  Green is a restful color and pleasant to look at particularly if you have the chance to partake of an early cup of coffee outside in the morning.  Lawn maintenance is still needed throughout the summer.

The Heat Factor

Cool season grasses go dormant in hot weather. In prolonged heat, these grasses take on both the color and the texture of shredded wheat rather than soft springy, green grass.  Water will not make the grass grow, but will prevent the soil surface from hardening and cracking.  Do not fertilize your lawn until the hot weather breaks. If you used Greenview Fairway Formula Fertilizer the grass will have nutrients available for when cooler days arrive.

Water

Frequent short bursts of water do not soak into the root zone; they evaporate before the grass can use them.  So water early in the morning, and water well.  Set a small cup within reach of the sprinkler and water until that cup has one inch of water in it.  If you do this weekly, your grass will be able to withstand the heat and stress of the summer.

Humidity

Locations that experience hot, humid summers can be prone to fungus problems in the lawn.  If your lawn suffers from a fungus, do not water at night as that will encourage dampness on the lawn and create a great environment for the fungus to spread.  Use Greenview Problem Solver - Bayleton to eradicate the fungus before resuming your watering regime.

Cutting

During the hotest stretch of the summer, keep the mover height around 3-4 inches.  This will keep the grass long enough to inhibit weeds and will keep the surface cool and moist enough to sustain good growth. 

In addition to the many lawn care articles on the Greenview Blog, check out the Greenview Fertilizer Website for more lawn care advice and tips.

Author Kate Copsey can be reached at www.katecopsey.com.

Got a Greenview Lawn? Send Us a Photo!

If you've been using Greenview Products to build, strengthen and establish your lawn, tell us about it and maybe your face and your lawn will show up on The Greenview Fertilizer Website.

Send a photo of your lawn (we like to see people too), along with your name and the city and state via email to greenviewblog@greenviewonline.com. Include a brief testimonial telling us what Greenview products you are using.  For photos and testimonials we post on the website, you will receive a cool Greenview baseball hat, though the best reward is a beautiful yard that's the envy of the neighborhood!

Weed and Feed

Many years ago, lawns were fed with manure from the farm and weeds were tolerated or hand pulled. Manure was spread in the fall and allowed to decompose over the winter releasing nitrogen into the soil.  This replaced depleted nitrogen in the soil and thus encouraged a burst of fresh green growth on the lawn.  If the manure was applied when it was too fresh, it could burn the lawn; if applied too late in the spring when there was no rain or snowfall then it could not decompose effectively.  Today we have modern fertilizers such as Greenview Fairway Formula Fertilizers that replace the manure and supply nitrogen to the lawn in a more effective way.

If your lawn contains weeds, you will need fertilizer and a herbicide, often called "weed & feed" to eliminate the weeds.  Weeds germinate in the spring when the soil warms up and perennial weeds begin their new growth cycle.  Most lawn weeds such as dandelions, clover and thistles are classified as ‘Broad Leaf’ weeds.  This enables them to be selectively treated without harming the grass blades.  The weeds need to be actively growing to be successfully treated. 

Crabgrass is slightly later to emerge than most broad leaf weeds, but crabgrass is an annual and can be treated with a pre emergent herbicide which will prevent the crabgrass weed seeds from germination.  Remember not to put Crabgrass Preventer down when you have just seeded the lawn, as it will prevent the germination of the grass seed.

By combining the broadleaf weed killer with a pre emergent crabgrass treatment along with the fertilizer such as in Greenview Fairway Formula Spring Weed & Feed with Crabgrass Preventer, you only need to make one application of the product.   Timing for a combined product is important, so you need to keep a careful eye on your garden and the weather so that you are able to ascertain when the majority of the weeds, but not crabgrass, are up and growing.  Alternatively you can let Greenview keep an eye on the weather and let them gauge when conditions are right for application of the products.  And while most of your neighbors are watching the sky and running to the store to fetch their heavy bags of fertilizer and weed treatments, yours can be delivered by Greenview right to your garage door at the right time. 

Learn more about the Greenview Annual Lawn Plan.

Author Kate Copsey can be reached at KTCopsey@aol.com.

How to Choose a Spreader

Most people use a mechanical spreader to distribute lawn treatments to their property.  These come in two sorts – a Drop Spreader and a Rotary Spreader. Both of these models require that you fill a hopper with material and push the spreader over the lawn.  For most homeowners, the biggest problem is knowing how far the spreader is depositing the nutrients. 

With a drop spreader, the device will have an opening in the base of the hopper that runs the width of the hopper.  When a trigger is pulled, the slot cover is pulled back and the material runs through the opening onto the grass.  As you walk, pushing the spreader ahead of you, the material is spread across the lawn.  The biggest problem with these spreaders is that for a large area of grass, you need to walk up and down numerous times. The swath of lawn fertilized for each run is limited to the width of the spreader, and probably no more than eighteen to twenty four inches.  The advantage is that when you have smaller areas, or areas close to walkways and flowerbeds, the chemicals are dropped right below the spreader and not onto surrounding areas.

With a rotary spreader, the material is placed into the hopper in the same way as for the drop spreader.  The prime difference is that the opening drops material onto a segmented dish, with only a small amount of material going into each segment.  When you walk behind this device, the dish rotates and flings the material onto the surrounding areas, thus covering a much wider area than the drop spreader.  Getting even coverage with this type of machine is more difficult, so make sure that you know how far the material goes and adjust your aisles accordingly.

For both spreaders, it is recommended that you cover the lawn in one direction, spreading one half the fertilizer.  Then cover the lawn a second time but in the perpendicular direction, using the second half of the fertilizer. 

Adjust the settings on the spreaders according to the label on the bag so that you get the appropriate amount of material spread evenly on the lawn.  If you are using Greenview products, and your spreader is not listed on the label, use our handy Spreader Setting Tool to find the appropriate spreader setting for your Greenview Lawn Care Products.

Author - Kate Copsey can be reached at KTCopsey@aol.com.

Spring Weed Control

Spring is a delightful time.  Alas, along with the coveted perennials, we might find some not so pleasant things emerging too – weeds!  Some of these weeds are perennial; others are annuals germinating from last years’ seed.  What you decide to put on the lawn to eradicate these weeds depends on what they are and when you plan to apply the product. 

To prevent weed seeds that were sown last fall from germinating, consider using a combination product this spring that contains fertilizer with a pre-emergent herbicide such as Greenview Fairway Formula Spring Fertilizer with Crabgrass Preventer.  This product should be put onto the lawn in early spring to prevent weed seeds from germinating. Do not use a pre-emergent if you plan on over-seeding or patching your lawn because the grass seed, like the weed seed, will not germinate in the presence of a pre-emergent treatment.  Remember that correct mowing heights and a healthy lawn, will also make it difficult for weed seeds to reach the ground and germinate.

For seeds that have already germinated, or for perennial weeds, you will need to use a lawn product with a post emergent herbicide for weed control.   Greenview Fairway Formula Spring Weed & Feed with Crabgrass Preventer, works on weeds while they are still small, while also fertilizing the lawn.  

Greenview has developed an easy 2 Step program for lawn care, which utilizes advanced nitrogen technologies in the fertilizer while combining the best weed control ingredients in a lawn care product.  You can purchase Greenview products at the Greenview Fertilizer website.  You will also want to check out the Greenview fertilizer subscription service.  Greenview will deliver the right products in spring and fall, to your door at the right time to apply them.    See what customers are saying about Greenview:

• "Hi…just wanted to say this year was the first time I used the Spring and Fall GreenView Fairway Formula application on my lawn in Ohio…was delighted with results…better than Scotts…thanks…"
• "As I've said in the past emails to your company…your product is truly outstanding and I've been using it for as long as I can remember, 10 yrs maybe?…Thanks for your time and an awesome product!!!"

Author - Kate Copsey can be reached at KTCopsey@aol.com.