Are you worried about the heat taking its toll on your trees, lawn, and shrubs? Let us help you take all the necessary steps to ensure a healthy yard.
Caring for Lawns In Extreme Heat
Many their lawns to simply go dormant during extreme heat and I have even heard “so called” experts recommend doing just that. The grass may revive under better conditions. However heat and drought resistant weeds will grow and spread. All while the grass has become very weak, stressed, and nutrient starved if it goes dormant. By the time the grass revives and gets healthy again you have a very weedy lawn.
You may prefer instead to preserve a healthy lawn through the drought. And with a few simple steps you can do that. Keep your lawn strong and healthy by fertilizing it. Even as summer begins to heat up you can apply a light dose of lower nitrogen fertilizer just before rain is expected or before watering your lawn. Your grass will be much better prepared for heat and drought because it is strong and healthy.
Also start raising your lawn mower blade as the summer heats up. Even without extreme conditions you should be raising the blade 2 or 3 times in stages through the summer. The longer grass (you should be mowing it to 3” long in the heat of summer) accomplishes several things. It shades the soil, keeping it moist and cool longer. Longer grass blades are also holding more water that can be used to survive until the next rain (much like a young plant or seedling can’t survive in heat, as the plant gets larger it is stronger and has more water available). And it allows you to continue a more regular mowing schedule without having to whack down a big chunk of the grass blades after the heat passes, which really stresses the lawn. During extreme heat and drought the lawn will be stressed and will not be growing as quickly so you will be able to longer between mowings. But if you let it get long just for a dry period and then mow off more than half the grass blades, you will wind up with a stressed lawn anyway and gain little.
The Tri-Cities can have some pretty high temperatures during the summer. Let Top Tree LLC show you how to keep your trees healthy during the hot summer months.