Fertilizer is one of the key components to ensuring your lawn achieves its optimal health throughout the year. It is important to ensure you are providing a good quality fertilizer and on the correct schedule as well. When your lawn is fertilized properly it will be able to better defend itself from both environmental and physical stressors such as summer heat, or weeds and disease. Depending on the fertilizer you use it may also play a large part in microbe activity located in the soil. This activity can be an important part of your lawn’s health as it can assist greatly with the breakdown of thatch and grass clipping build up, allowing the soil better access to water, air, and nutrients.
Here at Turf Systems, we offer a blended high quality granular fertilizer unique to our professional turf business that has the ability to deliver Nitrogen in 3 different ways. Once applied it immediately releases a soluble Nitrogen source to allow for a rapid green up of the lawn, followed by a consistent slow release form of Nitrogen that utilizes the many microbes in the soil to break it down and make it available to the plant. Once that begins it follows with a controlled release of Nitrogen providing the lawn with a predictable long term feeding schedule of up to 12 weeks. It can be mowed over, stomped or rained on, and will still perform at its best.
Our programs all contain 5 fertilizer applications that are applied from April through to November. Spring, early summer, summer, fall, and dormant winter. The nutrient composition of each one is catered to the given time of year it is being applied as your lawn’s demands change with the seasons. The three main nutrients your lawn needs are Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium. Here in Ontario, our soils are already rich with Phosphorus and providing more would only add potential to unwanted environmental impacts therefore, unless a soil test or plant growth indicates it is needed, we leave it out. Nitrogen and Potassium are the main components found within our fertilizer with the addition of Potash to increase the lawn’s defense system against its various pressures, and small amounts of Iron are added to our early summer, summer, and fall applications to help balance the summer stress the lawn encounters mid-season, as well as encourage that deeper green color everyone seeks.
When combining our high quality fertilizer with our educated watering and mowing practices, you will achieve up to 80% weed control as well. This is due to the fact that you are creating an environment that favors your lawn’s growth vs various weeds. Fertilize regularly, water once to twice a week providing one inch of water to the lawn, and cut every 5-7 days going no shorter than 3 inches. These actions alone can have a large impact on your lawns overall health and when followed, will help us fulfil our mission of greener lawns, healthier landscapes, and better environments.
If you have any additional questions about fertilizer components or our programs please feel free to reach out to one of our team members. We jump at any opportunity to help further educate our community on plant health and how it impacts the world we live in.
